Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
1

 

 

 

 
 
Stephen Huff’s 
Johnny 
Bullet 
(January 2001 – April 2002) 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
2
Johnny Bullet 
Contents 
 
Chapter Chapter Title  
Chapter 
Page 
Count 
Total 
Word 
Count 
Chapter 
Word 
Count 
A At the Very Far Away Ends 
of It All 
1 24 6,441 6,441 
B Burning 
25 10 9,233 2,792 
C Cause and Effect 35 8 11,359 2,126 
D Descent 
43 12 14,530 3,171 
E ‘Ever Been To Texas, Boy.’ 55 18 5,115 4,944 
F Fix It For Free 
73 15 8,868 3,753 
G Good Years 
88 22 14,562 5,694 
H Hand-Me-Down’s 110 7 16,288 1,726 
I I 
117 11 18,922 2,634 
J Johnny Bullet 
128 12 22,255 3,333 
K Kansas 
140 10 24,911 2,656 
L Liquid Fire 
150 15 28,585 3,674 
M Mother 
165 9 30,736 2,151 
N No Place Special 174 26 37,539 6,803 
O Or Reviled 
200 15 41,704 4,165 
P Palaces to Rule Them From 215 18 46,156 4,452 
Q Question With An Open End 233 34 55,789 9,633 
R Rusted Trestles 267 18 60,405 4,616 
S Sheol 
285 18 65,379 4,974 
T Three 
303 12 68,116 2,737 
U Unborn 
315 8 69,765 1,649 
V Voices 
323 7 71,433 1,668 
W Writhing Amid a Waste 330 10 73,970 2,537 
X Xanthippe 
340 12 77,026 3,056 
Y You 
352 5 77,178 1,052 
Z Zoroaster 
357 1 77,280 102 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
3

 

A 

AT THE VERY FAR AWAY ENDS OF IT 
ALL 

 
I was ten weeks on the road.  Going nowhere.  I had nowhere to go. 
I was ten weeks on the road, driving every day.  From here.  To there.  Never 
bound anywhere in particular.  Just driving.  Listening to the sounds of the tires on the 
pavement.  Dreaming with the slipstream.  Reading the spaces in the dotted line like 
obscure Morse.  Guessing at the meaning of everything.  Realizing the impetus of 
nothing. 
Ten weeks is a lot of days, is a lot of hours, is a lot of miles and a lot of road.   
Ten weeks is a long run and a long way.  Ten weeks lost is about as lost as any man ever 
gets. 
Somewhere down the road, at the crest of a hill on a narrow two lane blacktop 
that was all but obscured by the overarching boughs of a pine forest, my car started 
sputtering with a sound of mortal mechanical illness.  At the bottom of the valley, where 
the lane crossed a wild country stream atop a rusted ironworks bridge, it died. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
4
I let it coast to a stop in the grass on the far side of the bridge, then I sat through 
the night.  Thinking.  Wishing.  Hoping.  Praying. 
Regardless of my silent penance, the sun rose on the same green valley.  On the 
same tossing brook.  On the same bridge, and me sitting there in my dead Datsun.  
Rubbing my eyes and smacking a foul-tasting mouth. 
Opening the door, I breathed deeply of the pine soaked air.  Then, scratching 
myself obscenely, I stood. 
The pebbles that lay beneath the thin grass gouged my unshod feet.  I hopped and 
danced to the edge of the forest, where I leaned against an incredibly broad trunk to 
relieve myself. 
Amid the sounds of rushing water, I was startled to hear the unmistakable draw of 
a breath.  It came in a long, leisurely inhalation that sucked the wind through the trees 
and ruffled the legs of my trousers where they dangled between my knees. 
I turned my eyes on the deepest darkness between the towering columns, which 
supported a cathedral ceiling of shining emerald green.  I felt, saw, heard, smelled, 
touched... something.  Something that would sit silently in the shadows, watching, 
waiting, its patience the slow crawl of a clock’s hour hand.  Its desires as black and 
unknowable as the shadows that were its concealing shelter. 
Almost, I felt I could catch the sparkle of its distant, malevolent eyes staring back 
at me from all the unexposed reaches of the forest... a million eyes that were the 
collective gaze of a single beast.  All of which, I felt, must covet a virtual representation 
of myself, as I stood there at the edge of the trees in early morning silhouette. 
Shuddering, I shook my head to clear my thoughts.  Nonsense. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
5
As I walked away, I felt the expiration of that damnable breath, for the subtle 
wind came hot and moist from the opposite direction, and it drove the leggings of my 
trousers before me.  I sensed a reek of days old death and rotten decay on the air.  This 
suited me well. 
I retrieved a pair of shoes and my carryall from the car.  Then I started walking.  North.  
Along the roadside. 
My feet hissed through the thin grasses.  My steps crunched the stony soil.  I walked 
along the road.  Following where it would lead, grateful, as ever, for its comforting direction.  
While I walked, I listened... I listened for the forest’s sucking breath, which was that dismal 
country’s only sound. 
It was an ephemeral sigh, coming and going.  It was the carefully couched respiration of a 
stalking monster, which must necessarily linger close in its search for satiety, but which must 
also necessarily conceal itself from that which it would murder.  Hhhhhhhhu...  Uhhhhhhhh... 
softly.  Sensuously.  It came.  Incessantly.  This foul, sucking wind that reeked of rotted flesh 
and of endless pine forests. 
At the crest of a hill far along the road, I was startled to find a clearing in the trees of the 
valley at my feet.  There, a small town nestled among the low summits, its whitewashed 
buildings crouched fearfully beneath the trees.  A dozen buildings.  Perhaps two dozen houses.  
Neat.  Tidy.  Perfect.  I saw but one road.  In and out. 
Depending, I supposed, cinching my carryall tightly to my right shoulder and starting 
forth once more, entirely upon which way a man’s feet were pointed.  I started down the hill, and 
my vision was returned to the cathedral’s green ceiling.  The town was gone. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
6
Gone, but not forgotten.  I knew then, at least, I was going somewhere.  I thought it 
would be the absolute end of the road.  One way in.  One way out.  Wasn’t that how the end 
should best be described. 
I thought I might stop, and turn, and stand at the point where in became out again, at just 
that place in the street where forward became backward, there to look along the way I had come.  
I thought I might look along ten weeks of the road.  I thought I might stare down the terrifying 
specter of the beginning from the wonderful freedom to be found at the very far away ends of it 
all. 
For here, I would say, staking some sort of mental flag into the uncertain foundations of 
my mind, is the last of it.  Here is where it stops, and, consequently, where it all starts again. 
It might be the serpent’s tail.  Or its head. 
Yet it was a distant extreme, one way or another.  It was not the center.  It was not the 
middle.  It was not halfway.  It was ten weeks on the road, at the end of everything… that town 
and its monstrous forest. 
I walked a long way.  Though I could not see it for the cathedral’s emerald arches, I felt 
the sun sliding along the sky into its nightly grave.  I felt that foul breath come colder and 
damper.  My feet moved a bit faster.  Up one hill, down its valley to the next. 
I walked hours.  I walked miles.  I held my nose at the stink of my imaginary monster’s 
horrid expirations. 
The first experience I had of the town and its people came in the shape of an old man and 
his lazy dog.  They stood at the side of the road, him leaning on a rusted and dented mailbox 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
7
perched alongside a dirt drive, the dog sleeping in the weeds at his feet.  He wore ragged black 
trousers, a faded black shirt, and a battered fedora, also black.  His face was pale and long and 
infinitely experienced. 
He watched me near, his expression slack but observant.  He watched me pass with the 
same face.  At my back, when I was but a stride beyond him, I heard him spit.  I heard him 
mutter curses.  I thought I heard my own name among them. 
When I turned, he was gone, though the overgrowth of foliage alongside the dirt drive 
shuddered to betray his passage.  The dog yet lay in the weeds, its heavy head lifted to watch its 
master’s fading back. 
Then it turned its doleful eyes upon mine, as if to caution.  Do not go that way.  For that 
way is the end of all things. 
Within its watery eyes, I saw flames, a great burning.  I saw faces, swarming faces all 
contorted and twisted with murderous madness, craven lunacy, stark terror.  I saw the end... of 
the world, perhaps. 
Then I shook my head free of such fancy.  Nonsense.  It was a dog sleeping in the weeds 
at the roadside.  My feet made a crunching noise of the graveled soil once more, as I walked into 
the town at the end of the road. 
Perhaps a mile beyond the old man and his dog, I approached a ramshackle store, where 
it lurked to one side of the blacktop.  It was a clapboard affair with a high facade.  Faded letters 
named it simply ‘Town Store’.  I found it utterly uninspiring.  Somehow, it suited me well. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
8
I crossed its rutted dirt apron, and mounted the uncertain wooden steps to its high porch.  
The doorway was guarded by a rusted screen, which screeched frightfully when I pulled it open.  
I stepped inside, and squinted to define the gloom. 
A dour woman stood at a counter, polishing a mug with a grimy rag.  A man in a plaid 
coat sat at the lunch counter before her.   While another tall, gaunt man stalked the aisles of the 
little store, the crease of his brow betraying his intent search for something. 
They all turned to stare me to the register.  The old woman continued with the rag and the 
mug, her mean little eyes fixed on mine. 
“What you want here, mister.” belched she unceremoniously. 
I scratched my days old beard and sized her, even as she sized me.  “A glass of ice 
water.” 
“Like hell.  You got money.” her hands busy with the rag and the mug. 
“Some.” 
“Well, then, I guess you can have some water.  No charge.  Sit down there next to Merle, 
it’ll be a minute.”  She turned to fetch my request, and paused as if on afterthought.  “Sure you 
won’t be having something more.” 
“Maybe.  I don’t know yet.”  This seemed somehow suspicious to her.  So I hastily 
added, “My car broke down by the bridge last night.  It was a long walk.  All I can think of is 
that glass of water right now.” 
She squinted her eyes a bit, and I took that to mean she had accepted my story.  Then she 
was busy with a fuss of noise that I felt was excessive for the draw of a simple glass of water. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
9
Merle stared at me in a sullen stillness.  I caught his eye and dipped my head by way of 
greeting.  “Not much traffic on the road today.” 
He laughed.  Not just a polite sort of laugh, but a long, guffawing, knee-slapping laugh 
that verged on lunacy.  I certainly failed to find the joke.  Yet he choked himself off the stool and 
out the door without a word. 
“What the hell got into him.” I demanded of the old woman, as she dropped a cloudy 
glass of murky liquid on the bar before me.  “I don’t get it.” 
She grunted, and turned an unfriendly shoulder.  “I guess you don’t,” was her only reply. 
I drowned in the water, and wished for more when it was gone.  The old woman’s back 
told me I would get nothing more without a purchase of some kind, however, so I laid a twenty 
on the counter like it was nothing.  Like I had a hundred more in my front pocket.  Like it wasn’t 
the last twenty dollars I owned. 
I tried to think of the cheapest thing a place like this might serve.  Eventually, I asked for 
a cheese sandwich.  With lots of mayonnaise, and another glass of ice water. 
“Don’t you want fries or chips or something.” she growled, apparently gravely 
disappointed with me. 
“No,” I lied.  “I’m on a diet.  Nothing fried, you know.” 
That soured her face a bit.  She glared at me with a complete lack of understanding, and I 
felt as though I might have recently descended from a distant planet. 
“Well, we ain’t got no cheese, and we ain’t got no God damned sandwiches with lots of 
mayonnaise, neither.  Matter of fucking fact, kid, this town ain’t got nothing you need.  It ain’t 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
10
got nothing you want.  This town.  This place.  Me.  We got no use for you, nor your God 
damned twenty dollar bills!” 
I was taken aback, to say the least.  Especially given the fact that she promptly snatched 
the bill off the counter, and punched a purchase into the register at the end of the counter.  
Returning exactly seventeen dollars and forty three cents, she placed both beefy hands on the 
counter top and leaned close. 
She reeked of onions and unwashed armpits and stale whiskey.  Her face up close was a 
road map of lines and blemishes.  Her breath was a hot summer wind blown off a compost heap. 
“Was a time, boy, when I might have laid you out on that floor there with a Browning 
automatic rifle.  Was a time, when you woulda run at the sight of me.” 
I thought how badly I wanted to run even now from the sight of her.  Yet I held my 
tongue.  I think I swallowed with difficulty. 
“What the hell would you know about that.” 
For many long seconds that might have been hours that might have been days that might 
have been weeks that must have been years, she stared at me without saying anything further.  I 
stared back. 
Ultimately, I spurred the situation forward a step with, “So, do I get the cheese sandwich, 
or what.” 
She backed up, turned her head, and spat to the floor.  “God damned cheese sandwiches.” 
“Do you have Swiss cheese.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
11
“‘Do you have Swiss cheese.’” She mocked me like a small child, and I could not stop 
the surprised laughter.  Surely this was a bizarre act.  “What are you, kid, some kind of fucking 
woman.  You some kinda fag, boy.” 
I wondered if this was the sort of thing that had sent Merle home with such craven 
merriment on his tongue.  “No.  Just hungry, that’s all, and I like Swiss cheese.  It reminds me of 
my father.” 
“You little bastard, you never had no father.”  She spat this over her shoulder, as she 
reached for a tied loaf of ordinary white bread and a jar of mayo with the same shocking reach. 
“My step-father, I mean.” 
“Yeah, that’s better.  Bastards always get stuck on the first man that spanks their asses.  
Just because the asshole slaps you around a bit, you figure he’s your daddy.  What was he to you, 
kid, really.  The prick that fucked your mother.  The wallet that paid the bills.  Or was he 
something worse in the darkness when no one was watching.” 
My face fell then, I felt it.   Suddenly, the joke was old. 
“Fuck you, bitch.  Just get me my sandwich.”  My own words shocked me, but I could 
not catch them once released. 
Almost immediately, I felt a heavy hand fall upon my right shoulder.   It was the gaunt 
man that had stalked the aisles.  I knew this immediately, though I didn’t turn to catch the man’s 
face.  His grip was firm and painful. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
12
“You’ll keep your tongue, friend.  Bonnie don’t mean nothing with the truth, 
however she sees it.  She sees it.  That’s enough for us that know her.” 
He turned me atop the stool and let me loose.  “Get him the sandwich, Bonnie, 
and a bag of chips, too.  Add a soda.  Bring them out to us on the porch there, wrapped 
for the road, you hear.” 
She snarled and moved to finish the task.  While the tall, gaunt man drew me from 
the lunch counter with a turn of his head. 
I followed him through the screech of the screen door, out onto the porch, where 
we sat in a pair of rusting metal chairs that had been painted countless times in countless 
hues.  For an eternity, we sat there rocking on the spring legs of the chairs, our eyes on 
the forest, our skin prickling with its hot, moist breath. 
Finally, he spoke from the corner of his mouth.  “She’s right, you know.” 
“About.” 
“Everything.  Bonnie’s got this way with her.  A scary way, that always sees 
exactly what will be.  Somehow.  Like a witch, I reckon, or such.” 
“A witch.  You’re shitting me.” 
“Not like them picture book witches, but... she has a way with the truth.  She 
knows.” 
“She was just guessing, about my father, I mean.  She got a rise out of me, and 
pushed it.” 
“No, it’s more than that, but it’s not all.  She was right about the Browning 
automatic rifle, too.  She has one.  She’s been known to use it.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
13
I struggled to pull my gaze from the stillness of the trees.  “You serious.  She’d 
shoot me, just like that.” 
“Maybe.  Maybe not.  Can’t be too sure about Bonnie sometimes.   Not that way, 
but you can believe that she knows things.  Things she couldn’t know.  Things she 
shouldn’t know.” 
“Like what.” 
He turned his cold, steely eyes on mine then.  I saw flames within the dark pits of 
his pupils.  A great burning.  Countless faces and arms and open, grasping hands, thrust 
up from the throng to clutch at me, to devour any slightest touch of salvation that I might 
provide.  I saw a light of genuine insanity flickering there, the uncertain burn of midnight 
torches borne upon the rush of a maddened mob. 
I shook my head free of these thoughts.  Nonsense. 
This was but a man.  Sitting on a rusted chair.  On a rotten porch.  In a shitty little 
town. 
“Like what.” I asked again, uncertain that I had really spoken earlier. 
“Like everything that’s bloody and bad.  She sees into the future like headlights 
shine into the dark, but only to guide a man along the path of evil.  She sees, but 
everything she sees swims in guts and slaughter.” 
The porch screen screeched.  I jumped, and was afraid.   Bonnie was there, a nice 
little bag dangling from her scarred right hand, much as a tiny dead mouse might dangle 
from a feline’s drooling jaws. 
“Here’s your cheese sandwich, you little faggot.  Now get the fuck off my 
property.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
14
I jumped up to stand, and cowered to accept the sack, my eyes never leaving hers.  
I didn’t know much about guns, but I thought it unlikely she was concealing a Browning 
automatic rifle beneath her dingy aprons.  It seemed safe enough. 
“Here’s what you don’t know, you little freak,” she called after me, as I 
descended the stairs at an unseemly pace. 
I paused at the rutted dirt lot that faced the road, and I turned to see what more she 
would have of me.  The tall, gaunt man stood and hobbled closer to the old woman.  He 
slipped his arm about her ample waist and laid his head to her shoulder, though she was 
much shorter than he and it was a bit of a stretch. 
“You can chop off your toes to get leave from the chain gangs, boy, but all you 
really get is a few missing toes.  This town.  This place.  Me.  We got no use for the likes 
of you!  If you was a smart boy, which you ain’t, you’d point yourself south and head that 
away.  Back down to Texas, maybe, and Oak Cliff.  God knows, they need you, but like I 
says, you ain’t smart.  I can see that square away.  So you’ll point them little fairy feet 
north again, I reckon, once you reach that road.  You’ll head into town.  I say, go.  Go 
there, kid.  For it’s the place to be, if you’re looking for the far away ends of it all.” 
With that, she shook herself free of that clinging, gaunt man, who hobbled after, 
and she was gone.  For myself, I shook my head and refused to be disturbed.  She was a 
nut.  He was a nut.  That God damned dog was a nut. 
I had my cheese sandwich, and the road.  I knew the town was not far now. 
So I pointed my feet in that direction along the blacktop.  I started walking.  My 
shoes hissed through the thin grasses that lined the roadside.  My footsteps made a crunch 
of the stony soil. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
15
Munching the sandwich, I walked along the road toward town for a time, until I 
was eventually startled to hear the sputter of a motor approaching from behind.  I was 
more startled yet when I turned to see the gaunt man coming down the lane at the wheel 
of an ancient Ford. 
He stopped alongside me and tossed open a heavy steel door.  I head never ridden 
in such a relic.  I didn’t know artifacts like that could still be put to use. 
Curious, I swallowed the last bite of my sandwich, and tucked the bag of chips 
into my pocket, along with the soda.  Once inside, I slammed the door, and he worked a 
long, ungainly lever that could only be the gear shift.  We drove toward town at a walk. 
The contraption was a rattle trap.  He shouted over the din of the engine and the 
mechanism’s loose bolts. 
“You seem like you been walking a ways!  I thought you could use a lift!” 
“Yeah, thanks!” I shouted by way of reply. 
“Lord knows, it’s been times that I wanted for such a helpin’ hand, never to get it.  
A man deserves a break when he’s down on his luck!  Especially when he’s down on his 
luck.” 
If ever a man was, I was that man.  Ten weeks on the road, and unused to 
walking. 
“That Bonnie of mine, she’s a sharp jolt!  You can’t drink too deep of her all at 
once, you know.  You got to take her with a bit of salt and lime.  A sip at a time.” 
I shook my head.  “What the hell does she have against cheese sandwiches.” 
He laughed, and it was a genuine laugh, void of lunacy.  “Hells bells, boy, it ain’t 
the cheese sandwich.  Not your cheese sandwich, I mean.  It’s all of it.  It’s the work she 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
16
does.  The place where she lives.  The people she knows.  It’s this town, and she was 
right about that, too.  This is the very far away ends of it all, kid.  This is the end of the 
road.” 
I wondered how they had read my thoughts, and I was just coming to fear my 
apparent good fortune.  “I wish.” 
My strange companion turned a sharp eye on me in a flash.  “You’d best watch 
what you wish for, mister.  Like as not, in this place, you’ll get it.” 
“Yeah.  What’s so special about this place, anyway.” 
“Don’t you know.  It’s why you come, ain’t it.” 
I shrugged, then realized he couldn’t see the gesture, facing the road as he was.  “I 
came here by accident.  I told you.  My car broke down back at the bridge.  Otherwise, I 
would just be passing through.  Like everybody else that comes this way, I imagine.” 
He laughed.  “Nobody just passes through this town.  Nobody comes this way by 
accident. This town ain’t a dot on any map, I don’t guess, and there’s nobody to give 
directions.  ‘Cause there ain’t no directions to take.” 
“What the hell does that mean.” 
“What I mean to say is, you don’t get here by looking.  You don’t get here by 
intention.  Matter of factly, you don’t get here at all, ever, lest it be by some strange 
chance that can’t nobody explain.  You don’t get here unless you’re looking to be lost 
and forgotten.  You don’t get here, except you find yourself unable to fit anywhere else.” 
“Sounds ideal.” 
The gaunt man grunted and fought the wheel hard right to follow the road.  We 
sputtered up a low rise, and at the crest I saw the town exposed before the coupe’s 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
17
toppled hood ornament.  We rolled down the main drag at a slow run.  The town’s dour-
faced inhabits turned to watch our passage with dark, gloomy gazes, their faces void of 
expression, save for the contortions that the shadows wrought upon their brows. 
“Some think so.  Most do, I guess, at first.  Me and Bonnie, we thought so, I can 
tell you that much.  For a while.  Ten years maybe.  After that... it gets to be a strain, and 
not an easy strain of the sort that a man could take, not like gettin’ up for work early each 
day.  No, it’s the sort of strain that an incessant nag harvests in a man.  It’s the sort of 
strain that eats away at a man’s soul, a nibble at a time, so he’s torn apart in tiny bits and 
pieces over the course of a lifetime, slowly.  No gettin’ away from it.  No closin’ your 
eyes to it.  It’s always there, you see, in everything you eat and breathe and drink.  It’s 
everything you do, after a time.  It’s everything you are.  Separatin’ yourself from it 
would be like cutting off your own face.  So a man lives with it, until he can’t live with it 
no more.” 
When he fell silent, I prodded.  “Then what.’ 
His gaze turned to mine again, and flames burned brightly there.  Countless half-
human forms raced through that inferno light, madly seeking escape. 
“Then nothing.  It’s the last day on Earth, and good-bye.” 
Suddenly busy with the over-sized wheel again, he brought the Ford into a slanted 
park alongside the high porch of a store front.  Gears ground, as he stomped the clutch 
and the brakes repeatedly. 
“Here’s where you start walkin’ again, mister.  I got some business this evening.”  
He leaned over the wheel, and seemed exhausted from his solo combat with the 
mechanical beast.  “Sun’ll be down soon. You’ll want for a bed and dinner, I guess.  I’d 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
18
ask you over to our place, but Bonnie’d not like it.  Over there,” he grunted, tipping his 
head, “Lies the only flop house in town.  Back that way a block off the main drag you’ll 
find Lester’s garage.  He’s a lazy bastard, that Lester, but you can’t want for a finer 
mechanic when he does work.” 
“Does he do foreign cars.” 
“Foreign.  I don’t know what you mean there, mister, but if it has a motor and 
wheels, old Lester’s the man you need.” 
I pushed open the Roadster’s heavy steel door, and stepped out onto the uncertain 
running board.  As an afterthought, I paused before slamming it shut again, and declared, 
“Say, this is some car, you know.  It should be in a museum, or something.” 
He laughed, his laughter once more surprisingly sane.  “Yep.  Like as not, they’ll 
be saying the same thing about that heap of yours, before too many years go by!” 
I slammed the door on his wrinkled mask of merriment, and watched him back 
away with a grind of ancient gears.  He waved and sputtered away north, deeper into the 
little town’s black heart. 
“Fucking nut,” I breathed under my breath. 
I didn’t think I would be here that long.  Then again, I realized, I didn’t have 
much hope of leaving any time soon, either.  In fact, I didn’t have much hope for 
anything at all, at the moment.  I had less then twenty dollars in my pocket, and a change 
of clothes. 
How far could that take me in a place like this.  I supposed, hefting my carryall 
and taking a turn on the town’s sleepy center, just far enough. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
19
Climbing to the porch with a stomp of wooden footsteps, I found I was facing the 
town’s general store.  Across the street, a bank.  A pair of abandoned lots to either side, 
and somebody’s half-hearted attempt to convert one to a park.  A series of clothing and 
shoe shops completed the town’s main drag, and I was reminded of a 1950's era postcard. 
A door slammed at my back, and I was startled.  Spinning, I was surprised to find 
a deputy sheriff standing there, his eyes concealed by dark glasses.  He was fat and old 
and scarred, like a bull walrus.  I was instantly terrified of him. 
“Hey, mister,” he called, his words cast in my direction.  I turned hopefully to see 
if someone were standing behind me.  “You the owner of that broke-down piece out there 
on 241.” 
I nodded.  “Yeah.  How did you know.” 
He stomped over.  “You’re the only face in town I don’t have a name for, and 
nobody drives a car like that.  Must be you.” 
“Is there a problem.” 
“Nope.  No problem.  Just thought you might like to know I had it towed.  
Lester’ll be haulin’ into town here in a few minutes for you.  No charge.” 
I smiled.  Maybe my luck was turning, after all.  “Thanks.” 
His face remained impassive and neutral behind his shades.  “Don’t thank me, 
you stupid bastard.  It’s town law.  Let me see your ID.” 
My sphincter pinched shut instantly.  I choked and stammered and stalled, patting 
my pockets, as if searching for a wallet I had long ago dropped into a far away river. 
The deputy nodded and harrumphed disgustedly.  He crossed his huge, beefy arms 
over his barrel chest and towered over me.  “Mmmm hmmm.  Just as I thought.  I bet you 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
20
left it in your other pants, sort of accidental like.  Right.  Let’s go.”  He seized a painful 
grip of my upper right arm.  “Sherif’ll want to speak to you.  His office is just around the 
corner, here.” 
I stumbled to follow.  “Hey, what’s this all about, anyway.  What have I done.” 
“Done.  Done.  You haven’t done anything but the very worst possible thing.  
You come into town, boy, that’s what you done!” 
He jerked me along the high porch and around the corner.  Then across a little 
bricked street, and up onto another high wooden porch.  A faded metal sign indicated this 
was the ‘Town Sheriff’, and my sense of fear and dread swelled.  He yanked open the 
screen door, which screeched inevitably against its retracting spring. 
Shoving me rudely into the little office before him, I was half-tossed into a heavy 
wooden chair, which sat before a pair of battered desks that were cluttered with mounds 
of papers and official equipment.  “Sit down,” he belched needlessly, as I was already 
sprawled across that chair so it all but tipped me onto the floor.  “Sheriff’ll be here in a 
minute.  I got rounds to make, but don’t you move your ass an inch, you hear.  You 
disappear on me, I guarantee I’ll find you, and when I find you, I guarantee you’ll wish I 
hadn’t.” 
He was gone with a screech-bang of the rusted screen door.  I settled myself 
somewhat in his absence, and was not happy to see a heavy door of steel bars obscuring 
the passage into a central hall, which opened between the two desks at the center of the 
cramped office like an awful, gaping maw. 
The walls were covered with legal notices and fliers and wanted posters, but I 
noted curiously that all were yellowed and faded with the passage of ages of neglect.  The 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
21
grim faces that mugged there were a black and white collage of the past, and I doubted 
very much that any of those men and women were alive today to commit crimes of any 
kind. 
A door sounded open and shut from the far back of the building.  I heard steel 
frames striking steel frames, and a heavy jangle of keys.  I heard heavier footsteps 
rapping on the wooden floor, stomping closer as a stalking beast. 
Then the man appeared at the bars between the desks.  He was another big, battle-
scarred veteran of the streets, though his uniform was a bit tidier and his face a bit softer.  
His nose broken countless times, his eyes were wise and conservative.  He fixed me with 
a lengthy gaze, as he worked the jingling keys back and forth in their steel locks. 
Through the bars, he grunted.  “Just got into town, did you.  Mmmm hmmm.  
Thought so.  I heard they had picked up your car.  Lester’ll have it runnin’ in no time.”  
The sheriff heaved that heavy door open with an effort, and pushed it shut with a jarring 
SLAM at his back.  “I guess you met Deputy Barrents.  I’m Sheriff Estes.  We’re all the 
police force this town has, such as we are.” 
I pursed my lips into a thin smile, and wondered when the beating might begin.  I 
tried not to tremble. 
“Relax, son, you’re in no real trouble.  Not yet.  That’s just Barrents’ way, I 
guess, to stir a man up so, but just relax now, and listen a bit, and we’ll be moving on 
before the sun’s down.  You hear.” 
I nodded and said that I did.  “I must have left my ID in the car, I guess.” 
Sheriff Estes frowned, and sat in a protesting roller chair behind his desk.  “Now 
then, what we don’t want to start doin’, buster, is lyin’ to the law.  This town ain’t got 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
22
many rules, and I don’t give a shit about most of ‘em, even then.  We don’t abide a liar.  
We must have honor among thieves, my friend, or we must have chaos.  One way or the 
other.” 
Abashed, my head dropped.  I fussed with a fidget in my lap. 
“I can’t guess just what you done, for a fact, but let me speak a bit, then maybe 
we’ll hear some more from you.  Without the lies.  Okay.”  I nodded.  What choice did I 
have.  “Good.  You’re going to do alright, I bet. 
“Now, what I want to say is this; we checked your car.  There weren’t nothin’ in it 
at all.  Least of all there weren’t no identification.  We don’t pass things on to the state.  
Or the Federal government, for that matter.  We don’t check them numbers on your plates 
or your dash.  So we don’t know what all you really done outside town, you see.  Right 
now, far as we’re concerned, and when I say ‘we’, I mean to speak for the townsfolk 
entire, right now, you’re not a wanted man in any shape, form or fashion. 
“As far as we’re concerned, you’re an innocent babe.  You come to us just as free 
and clear as something white and fluffy fallen from the sky.  You get what I’m sayin’, 
boy.  Now that don’t mean we’re stupid.  That don’t mean we can’t guess.  ‘Cause we 
can.  They all come in with the same story, and different names to the places and people. 
“So, for you, it goes something like this... you’re a killer.  You done killed folk, 
and you’re a thinker.  So you thought some on what you done.  You’re a wisher.  So you 
wished it all away.  You wished for some place like this.  You been on the road a time.  A 
long time, longer even than you can remember, maybe.  Somewhere along the way, you 
tossed yourself into a river or buried yourself in a dark hole.  That is to say, you buried 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
23
everything you once were.  Your identification.  Your legal papers.  Your life entire, I 
guess, in some fashion. 
“Then you just started running.  Without direction.  Lost in a great wander.  Until 
you crossed the Black River Bridge, and come down 241 into town.  Into this place.”  He 
propped his booted feet on the desk and reclined into the chair, which cried out in pain.  
Folding his arms atop his breast, he continued.  “Now that you’re here, there ain’t no 
goin’ back, ever.  ‘Cause there ain’t but one way in, and no way out.  Now that you’re 
here, you’re here to stay. 
“So you got to know the rules.  You got to know our ways.  That’s my job.  That’s 
where ol’ Sheriff Estes shines!” 
I nodded and tried not to seem confused.  Just what the hell was he on about. 
“First off, there ain’t no denyin’ what you done.  If you talk about it, you gotta 
talk about the truth of it.  We don’t pardon bullshit, here, not a smidge, and there’s hell to 
pay for hypocrisy, boy.  It’s all but a capital crime. 
“Second, you can be and do whatever you want here.  ‘Cause there ain’t no rules, 
except for rule number one, but that’s just the trick of the place, ain’t it.  If it goes for 
you, then it goes for us all, and we can all do whatever and be whatever we like here.  
Even if we want to be ‘Town Sheriff’, you see.  So it just pays to be neighborly, 
generally speaking. 
“You’ll find that out soon enough, though, so it ain’t a formal kind of law.  It’s 
just the way things are.  We ain’t none of us angels, mister.  We’re all just like you.  We 
all came in the same way, in search of the same ideal and running from the same things.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
24
He closed his eyes, and let his head back as if to sleep.  “So that’s it.  That’s my 
speech.  You just go make yourself to home, now, you hear.  Lester’ll have your heap 
fixed up by tomorrow, and we already cleared a spot for you over at the flop.  You can 
stay there free until you get on your feet and find yourself a permanent roost.” 
Then the sheriff tipped his head forward to make a deadly, determined mask of 
his face, his eyes fixed on mine.  Within the central black of each pupil, I saw a pinpoint 
light of flames.  A distant view of a great burning.  A rushing mass of half-human forms 
churned through the inferno there, dashing back and forth without apparent order, in 
search of escape, perhaps, or to hasten the final fiery end of it all. 
“And, boy.”  He grinned a mesh of stained, pointed fangs.  “Hell’s a hot place 
after the sun goes down.  Maybe you want to be inside the first couple of nights.  Until 
you get the way of things, you know.” 
He lay his head back again to sleep, and dismissed me with a grunt.  I stood and 
lifted my carryall, and turned to find the door. 
The screen door screech-banged me free, and I was standing on the high wooden 
porch again.  Turning my gaze west through the treetops, I watched the sun plunge down 
to die in a bloody wash of crimson light.  Just down the road, I saw a sign that marked 
Lester’s garage.  My Datsun was parked there, its hood up and a mean little man busy 
with its broken works.  Back the other way a block or so, another sign marked the town’s 
only hotel. 
Smiling my own mesh of fine, white fangs, I pointed my feet toward home, and 
started walking, whistling tunelessly and quite certain that I had found my niche at last.  
Here, in this place.  This town.  At the very far away ends of it all. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
25

 

B 
 
Burning 

I felt it more than I saw it, that first sunset in town, hidden as the sky was by the 
ever-present pine canopy.  It came on a slow slide of shadows.  It came on a cold, foul 
breeze.  It came to a tune of distant howls and mysterious forest screams. 
I stood on that dilapidated porch in the center of that rundown town, and I 
wondered if I were safe, after all.  Out there, I knew, things were busy with death.  Soft, 
fluffy things cowered in the shadows of the night.  While terrors stalked among them, as 
relentless and tireless in their sanguine pursuits as the torpid rise of the moon.  Their 
acoustic terrors and lusts were as evident as a man’s ears could render them.  From that 
quarter a hare’s startled squeal.  While from this the snarl of hungry dogs.  Then round 
about ran the chase, so I could follow them in every detail without turning my head. 
Around to the back of the jail they seemed to fly, where it was finished with a 
snarling fury of snapping bone and ripping flesh.  Amid this last of it came the painful 
squeaks and squawks of that helpless animal, begging for mercy, perhaps, or a quick end 
to its dismemberment. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
26
Then all fell silent.  For but a time.  Until the next encounter, and the next mortal 
race for life or death. 
As I listened, I realized such games must necessarily be played out forever, as 
they had been playing from the start of time.  Large things must consume small things.  
The small things must devour yet smaller things still.  Life, I considered, is an empty 
belly, and death the same.  Just as life and death may be that same belly filled. 
Somehow, on some level, I felt that I had been swallowed by this town as surely 
as if it were a whale to gulp me down.  I was irrevocably lost in its dark belly, and no 
light to guide me free again.  How well it suited me. 
Just north of the main drag, I thought I heard the unmistakable sound of the gaunt 
man’s ancient roadster, where it puttered back and forth in the course of unknown, 
perhaps unspeakable, evening errands.  What had the gaunt man said of life here.  How it 
was a constant strain that must inevitably grind a man down to nothing.  Slow.  By subtle 
degrees. 
Fine, then, I thought, sucking a deep, reeking breath through my nostrils.  Let it 
come.  Let it come like a hammerfall atop my head.  Let it sound me to my bones.  See 
how I break.  See how I bend.  Not at all.  Not an inch.  Not a dent.  Not a scratch. 
With a sure thumb, I cinched the carryall’s strap tight to my right shoulder, and I 
started down the steps toward the hotel.  I was not above advice, and the sheriff’s advice 
had seemed proper.  I should spend the first night or two inside, I suspected, and might 
have suspected it in ignorance, had I not been told. 
All signs pointed to... something... brewing on the night.  Unexplainable, it was not a 
tangible, it was an emotion, a sensation.  It was a heavy burden of dread draped about my 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
27
shoulders.  It was a scent of small burnings that verged on conflagration.  It was the prickle of 
hairs at the nape of my neck.  It was the forest.  The un-silent forest that had before been 
quietude defined.  With the night, that dark place had awakened a thousand times, and was 
wakening further, even as I sought shelter from its unwholesome considerations. 
I felt its myriad eyes upon me.  Eyes of all kinds, turned upon my form with every 
imaginable regard.  Hunger gazed at me hungrily.  Fear watched for me fearfully.  More, I felt 
the presence of larger things that regarded me not at all, except that they regarded me as a man 
might an insect, its life less than a brief thought, its death a quick stamp of a shoe and so easily 
forgotten. 
With the deepening darkness, street lamps flared to life along the avenues, bursting into 
intense illumination one by one, though in rapid succession.  It was brief show, as the streets 
were short and travelers few. 
It did little to dispel the night.  Contrarily, it seemed to encourage the rushing fall of 
gloom.  For the shade seemed charged by this rebellion to mass at its fringes and threaten an 
overwhelming, undeniable defeat. 
If that dismal forest ruled this dreary town, I thought, then that towering absence of 
sunlight ruled the forest.  It was, after all, master of the cycles that stirred all creatures awake and 
to sleep.  A haughty god, I thought, had cupped his black hands about the world to, laughing, 
choke it unconscious, that the unhappy monsters of its id should run wild and loose as in 
nightmares, free to reap carnage and sew slaughter, free to devour or succumb to a frenzy of 
feeding.  Such freedom transcended benefit.  Such freedom was sickness.  Disease.  It was all 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
28
and sanction for none.  It was authority to prosper unrepentant depravity, to pursue anonymous 
wickedness, to harvest unwholesome delights with gluttonous, reaching hands that are never 
denied. 
To what purpose.  To what ends.  To no end, at all, I realized, but the end, itself. 
For termination must, necessarily, append all beginnings.  It was the post-requisite of all 
pre-requisites.  It was one of a matched pair of bookends to frame the shelf.  All else was 
between.  Was halfway.  Was the middle.  All else was defined by its definitions. 
Thus, the sun should rise again.  Rising, it must go down once more. 
So these things that squealed and snarled in the night were assured their bloody games.  
No release could save them the relentless cycles of it all.  One time around must, naturally, be 
the last time around.  This night.  Or the next.  Predator or prey.  Spoiler or spoiled. 
As I crossed the street, my head hunched between my shoulders to watch my feet strike 
the asphalt, I was startled from my thoughts by a soft toss of air from feathery wings.  From my 
back, so close that I felt its passage in my hair, a large owl with bulbous night eyes swept down 
from the heavens to perch upon a lamp at the corner before me. 
There it sat to reproach me with terrific yellow orbs and a curiously cocked head.  Back 
and forth went its liquid skull, up and down, round and round, all at once.  It flapped its wings, 
disturbed that I was not afraid. 
When I passed beneath it on the street, it defecated at my feet.  I saw the droppings fall, 
and was attracted to their splatter on the blacktop.  A mass of half-digested skeletal remains 
crumbled there.  Evidence of my own thoughts. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
29
With a ghoulish screech, it toppled from its perch and swooped past me once more, along 
the high porch walk, and around a far corner.  As if preceding me to my destination. 
I stomped along to follow, dwelling upon the unpalatable fall of night and its implications 
for those of us trapped within the forest’s concealed heart, until I found myself standing before a 
pair of broad double doors.  Not surprisingly, a sign over the entry indicated that this was the 
‘Town Hotel’. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
30
Unperturbed by its unimaginative heading, I pushed the doors wide, and let my 
feet fall upon the far side.  The foyer was done in surprisingly tasteful, though somewhat 
lurid, tones of rose and blush.  Its floors were of dusty marble tile, its walls of ancient, 
wrought hardwood.  All its windows were sashed with heavy velvet draperies the color of 
fresh blood.  While its many lamps burned behind rose colored lenses to light all with the 
disturbing glow of hell. 
A high desk stood at the far side of the room, stairs to one side, and a restaurant 
entrance to the other.  A tall, thin woman stood there, waiting.  Her hair was black as the 
nightfall at my back, and her eyes blacker.  Her red lips slashed her pale face with a 
sensuous splash of color to suit the interior of the place. 
I smiled.  She did not return it. 
I shuffled across the room, sniffing its scents of age and sensing its history, which 
settled down upon my shoulders as a gentle drift of dust motes.  This building, I realized, 
was old.  Older than it showed.  I was filled with the certain knowledge that desperate 
people had died here.  Images of dangling ropes and blood-filled bathtubs flashed before 
my vision, unbidden. 
At the counter, I faced her for the first time.  Her eyes seemed void of whites.  
They were two windows that exposed the ultimate darkness of her soul directly.  The 
pupils and irises of that startling gaze were indistinguishable, and I was remotely afraid, 
intimately attracted. 
I smiled wider still, and let my elbows down easy on the desk.  I let my eyes 
wander the length of her slender frame with obvious desire. 
“I need a room.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
31
Her lips barely moved as she spoke.  She crossed her arms before her subtle 
breasts to emphasis her disinterest.  “You need a lot of things about now, I imagine.” 
“Yeah, I guess.”  I cleared my throat, and let my eyes fall to the register.  “The 
sheriff told me you would have a bed for me.” 
“Awful nice of him to volunteer what isn’t his.” 
I was taken aback, and suddenly reminded of the change in my pocket.  “That’s 
what he said.” 
“Typical.  Sign-in.”  She tossed me a pen and reached for a single key on an 
unadorned ring, which hung with its mates at her back.  I hadn’t seen such nostalgia 
except in movies. 
“How old is this place.” I enquired to make conversation, scratching somebody’s 
name onto the paper. 
She shrugged.  She didn’t know.  She didn’t care. 
“It seems full of stories.” 
“I suppose.  What of it.” 
My stupid, boyish grin faded to a manly frown of frustration.  Bitch.  “Somebody 
shit on a stick and hand it to you for a fudge-pop, or what, lady.” 
“I don’t make small-talk.” 
“Well, then what do you do to make your guests feel welcome.” 
“I don’t murder them in the night and steal their money.  Isn’t that enough.” 
I thought she might be jesting, but one glance into the unfathomable depths of her 
midnight gaze was a rude slap of reality.  Far off in the unattainable reaches of those 
pitch pools, I thought I saw a flicker of burning, a wild blaze raging uncontrolled.  It 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
32
danced with a gentle movement that belied its potency and danger.  It flickered as a 
candle’s solitary flame, while it verged on back draft and lethal explosion. 
Shaking my head to clear it of such nonsense, I was reminded of the day’s long 
walk and of my own weariness.  “I’ve been in a lot of places, you know.  A lot of states, 
and it’s funny.” 
She rolled her black eyes and sighed.  “What’s funny.” 
“It’s funny how the people are like the place.  If it’s an unhappy place, they’re 
unhappy people.”  I snatched the key from the desktop, and smashed my face into an 
impudent, false smile.  “And this, I think, is one un-fucking-happy place.” 
“You’re so observant,” she taunted.  “It’s upstairs.  Down to the end of the hall.  
On the left.  It’s the smallest, coldest room in the place.  You have an outside wall, and a 
view of the town square over the alley.”  For the first time, I saw her smile, and I realized 
that her smile was the antithesis of its own effect.  It was not a smile, though it was 
formed from a set of upturned lips that exposed an even row of perfect, white teeth.  
Rather, it was something murderous and obscene.  It was the gloating grin of a sadist, 
ever happy to witness blasphemy.  “It should be quite a show tonight.” 
I watched her over my shoulder, as I mounted the stairs with a steady thump of 
heavy feet.  I was tired.  Too tired to work her out to the finest degree.  She was a 
question, and I had no desire to cipher the answer. 
At the top of the stair, I faced a long hall that was lined on either side with the 
alternating shadow and show of closed doorways and brightly burning wall lamps.  All 
was not still, or quiet.  With each ascending step, I heard something human rising in order 
of dominance above the general din of nightfall. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
33
This was an alternating grunt and pant of human breath.  It came heavy with 
passion and laced with pain.  Its tones begged mercy, while demanding further abuse.  A 
base thump of flesh against flesh against something heavy accompanied the tune. 
As I mounted the walk and passed through the rooms to my own, I realized that 
one of the doors halfway along the hall was opened a crack.  A face was there at the gap, 
ruddy and red and half-obscured.  It panted.  It grunted.  It squealed.  It ebbed back and 
forth in the shadows beyond my vision.  Another was there at her back, I thought, for 
those were a man’s fingers at her shoulders and upon her dangling breasts.  He cursed 
passionately, while he stabbed her from behind repeatedly, unashamed that I should 
watch. 
She grunted.  She smiled.  She refused to close the door.  She watched me 
approach, and she watched me pass. 
Twisting the key in the lock of my chamber, I turned to get a final glance of it, 
and was surprised to see her head protruding from beyond the frame, bobbing back and 
forth with each bestial thrust.  Her passion-smeared eyes remained fixed on mine. 
Shaking my head with the strangeness of it all, I entered into my hellish little cell 
and pushed the door closed at my back.  The place was musty and reeked of ages.  A flick 
of the light switch revealed what I expected.  A single bed crowded the nearest wall, and 
a nightstand huddled alongside to guard it well in the night.  An ugly little lamp lingered 
atop the stand.  A small dresser of drawers lurked in the far corner, and a squat television 
sat perched upon it, its one great eye black and dark and cold.  No stories to tell, I 
thought, after all. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
34
At the far side, beyond the bed, a single window stood partially obscured by twin 
bolts of heavy, crimson velvet.  I went to the view, tossing my carryall onto the bed as I 
passed, and I swept the drapes aside to see what I might see. 
Quite a show.  I snorted, turning a disdainful eye on the absolute boredom that 
cowered in the darkness at my feet.  What a joke.  What a miserable joke. 
I showered, and slept the fitful, empty sleep of a man too burdened with 
conscience. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
35

 

C 

Cause and Effect 

 
 
My father, my step-father I mean, sat in his folding chair, a beer kept safe at his 
crotch, a shotgun laid across his lap.  His judicious eye sought mine, and he cast a 
wrinkled wink in my direction.  I always gushed when he did that, despite my resolve. 
‘You see,’ he rumbled, his voice a tinny echo, an artifact, of its reality, ‘It’s like 
that wherever you go.  Whoever you know.  You can’t trust nobody.   I mean absolutely 
nobody. You got that.’  He pulled from the mouth of his beer, which drank from him 
more deeply than he drank from it.  The tree line, of which we were a foreign, 
camouflaged part, swayed this way and that at the draw and subsidence of a hot August 
wind.  Buzzards circled the hazy distance.  I thought I could smell the stink of them.  
‘Least of all somebody you think you can trust.  ‘Cause it’s those bastards, bastards like 
me, that want you to think just so.  That you can trust them, I mean.  ‘Cause just when 
you start to believe enough to turn your back, just then SMACK!’ he laughed, slapping 
his knee, ‘You’re like these birds we have in our vests.’ 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
36
He patted his hunting jacket, where I knew an illegal number of broken doves lay 
in state.  I was reminded of those that had fallen from the sky alive, fluttering upon the 
ground, all flying down and terrified scuttle.  I was reminded of his hands, so kind that 
could put me safely to sleep each night, and that could in the same day, driven by the 
same mind, tear off the heads of such helpless, pitiful things. 
Fearing for my neck, I jerked my eyes from his, and watched the far away 
buzzards.  ‘You like the way they ended up, boy.  Huh.’ 
I shook my head, no.  It was best not to lie to him.  Ever. 
‘Good.  ‘Cause it ain’t pretty.  Even I see that, boy.  You know.  I bet you do.  
What the hell do you know.  Nothing, that’s what.  You think I don’t feel for these birds 
at all, but you’re wrong about that.  I feel bad for them.  Them that once flew so free and 
that will be sizzling in my fry-pan tonight.   I feel for them, but I also see them yonder.’  
His great arm leapt from the shotgun, so I was afraid once more for my neck, though he 
only pointed south.  ‘Ten or twenty of them.  Flying on their way, happy as you please.  
You think they’re flying that way by accident.’ He grunted, and pulled from the can with 
a bobbing throat.  ‘Not fucking likely.  They know better than to come this way.  While 
these,’ he gloated, patting his bloody, feather-strewn vest, ‘Had no such sense, so you can 
easily cull them out from one another.  The sensible and the senseless.  The wary and the 
unaware.  Do you see.’ 
I nodded my head.  I suppose, on a child’s level of understanding, that I did.  Still, I 
couldn’t help but think that those flying far away to the south were no more aware of our 
presence than those that had been slain.  I couldn’t help but consider that, but for a gentle turn 
one way or another, but for an unlucky gust of the air, but for a fatal twist of fate, those that lived 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
37
differed very little from those that died, and that my father’s shotgun had made this difference.  
Save for him, they might have been the same.  Tonight, as the sun set and the wind died, they 
might have roosted together in a furious flutter of wings and tail feathers, hooting how their 
journey was long, and of how far was left to go. 
Not tonight.  Tonight, they would gather fewer than had assembled by morning’s light.  
Tonight, mates would go missing, never to be seen or heard again. 
We would pass them through our guts with fistfuls of fried potatoes, and flush them along 
to oblivion some time tomorrow.  I sighed, and stirred the stony soil with the toe of my shoe, 
which only just reached the ground.  I was glad I was not a dove.  At the same instant, I was glad 
I did not carry the shotgun.  Dimly, I was certain I could never rest peacefully again, knowing I 
had committed such crimes. 
‘So...’ he drawled, half-intoxicated.  ‘You still think you’re a hunter.  Still got what it 
takes to bring home the kill.’ 
I gulped.  I nodded.  It was best not to lie to him, ever, but it was a worse thing to stir in 
him some doubt of my loyalty or burgeoning manhood. 
‘I bet.  Tell you what... next time I wing one, I’ll send you into the bush for it.  Okay.  
That way, you can twist its neck and prove it.’ 
My eyes grew large then, I could feel it and I could not prevent it.  My face paled.  I felt 
that, too, as a sudden cooling of my cheeks where my blood was abruptly afraid to flow.  My 
head started shaking negatively back and forth before I thought to stop it.  I stammered how he 
was better at it than I, and how I might make a mess of it. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
38
He laughed cruelly and emptied his beer with a final drought.  ‘Hell, boy!  What’s to 
mess up.  It’s pulling the head off a little bird, it ain’t, say, rebuilding an engine from a short-
block!  If you miss it the first time, why, you just reach down with the other hand, get a good 
grip, and YANK!’  He laughed again, crushing the can with a massive paw.  ‘And if you fuck 
THAT up, then you just put its head under your boot and tug on its feet with the other!  It’ll give, 
one way or another!’ 
My stomach rolled.  I fervently hoped that all the doves in the country had heard him, and 
were even now flying away at their most desperate speed. 
Still, I turned an eye to the merciless August sun, and I realized it hung high in the sky.  
Hours of the day remained.  Enough time to slaughter whole flocks of game birds.  Enough time 
to steep me to my elbows in foul, stinking blood and oozing guts. 
As if to pontificate my concerns, I detected an unmistakable squeak of little wings 
approaching blindly from behind the tree line.  They neared quickly, and I hoped that he had not 
heard.  Then, no, he tossed the can into the dry grass at his feet, and laid his murderous hands 
upon trigger and guard.  His head cocked over his right shoulder, he listened and he waited.  
Slowly, inexorably, he raised the barrel to point it in the general direction of his quarry’s flight. 
A half dozen winged forms raced into view just above the treetops.  He was quick with 
the shotgun.  Firing and racking new shells mechanically, he squeezed off half a dozen shots 
from his unplugged magazine, and sent four more angels crashing to earth, where they twitched 
in death.  All of them, I hoped. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
39
Fate was not to be denied so easily, however, and I saw with a soul-crushing sense of 
dread how one, at least, had not been slain.  It hopped and fluttered pathetically, tangled in the 
high, sunburned weeds and its own tragically shattered wings. 
‘There it is boy,’ he barked, reaching for fresh shells and jacking them into his weapon’s 
smoking belly.  ‘Your very first.  Fetch it and them others, and hurry, before it beats itself to 
death.’ 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
40
I dropped to the ground on shaking legs. Stepping high through the sun-burned 
ground cover, I neared the hapless animal, and chased it uncertainly a few steps along, 
hoping it would escape me, before it fell, exhausted and panting and bleeding, at my feet.  
Its eyes were tiny marbles, black on black, and I wondered where I had seen such eyes 
before.  How they regarded me with glazed but obvious terror and loathing. 
It fled from my grip when I reached for it, its final throes extreme and mortal.  It 
tore itself un-cautiously to be free, as if my touch would burn it unspeakably.  I stumbled 
along to follow, until it neared the brushy tree line and verged on freedom. 
I might have watched it go happily, save for a shadow that crossed my back and 
peeped over my shoulder... save for a crunch of footsteps in the dry, stony soil, and a 
scent of beer and sweat and gun powder and dried blood.  He was standing there, I knew, 
watching.  Waiting.  Wondering, perhaps, what I might do.  His hand on the shotgun.  His 
gray eyes on my huddled back. 
So I stooped sadly, then fell to one knee, scooping the terrified dove into both 
hands and lifting it to eye level almost reverently.  I held it gently, lest it be injured, and I 
stared into those black on black eyes, which bulged with unknowable pain and fear. 
The dove’s gaze rolled sickly, as if to bid me set it loose or to finish its murder 
quickly.  With lethargic effort, I raised the grip of my right hand, so it held the head, its 
beak snapping my palm ineffectually, and so my left smothered its warm, throbbing 
body.  Something warm and hot and liquid rolled down my cheek then, and I could not be 
certain if it was a tear or a spray of hot, rolling blood. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
41
Its head came off in my hand, and I flung it with disgust into the trees.  Its body 
twitched.  I fought for control of my guts, and tried to make an impervious mask of my 
face before I turned to hand him his trophy. 
I must have done it well, too, for he was grinning as a devil.  He ruffled my hair 
as he did only when I had seemed manly before him.  Taking the decapitated carcass, he 
congratulated me with heavy back-slapping and ear tugging. 
We gathered the other three birds, all plump with summer bounty, and we 
returned to our folding chairs and the ice chest.  From this wondrous box of chilled 
pleasures, he plucked forth two dripping cans of light beer, handing one to me. 
I accepted it uncertainly, suspiciously.  It was a test.  He was waiting to see if I 
was eager to drink it, and would scold me if I did.  So I offered to return it, but he shook 
his head and forced it back into my hands.  With a pop of his own can, he urged me to 
open and drink.  Without speaking, I did so, sipping from the yeasty liquid timidly.  He 
was quick with his reach, and forced the can bottom up, so I was all but drowned in it, so 
I choked on it, so I coughed it from my lungs and blew it from my nose and belched it 
from my belly, so it all but flowed from my ears.  I drank until my throat tired, until my 
stomach swelled, until the can was empty. 
Again, I had filled him with pride.  This thing that I had done was good, his face 
and his laughter sang.  I grinned with him, foam running from my cheeks and chin to 
soak a manly ‘V’ into the collar of my t-shirt.  Bubbling with sinful glee, he drained his 
own can, and we crushed the pair together, him flexing a massive grip and me stomping 
mine into the dirt. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
42
When next we sat to hunt and slaughter, we sat there alongside one the other, a 
happy set of killers.  Matched bookends to frame the shelf.  Each of us the far away end 
of it all, the terminus of some beginning.  Implements of fate.  Neither of us sitting in the 
middle, any longer. 
I had never considered it to be puissant, that seat my father, my step-father I 
mean, so enjoyed.  I had always believed it to be a grotesque and morbid place to be.  I 
had never envied him it.  Yet, in that moment, just then, as we laughed and made jokes of 
blood and entrails, in that moment, I was jealous of his shotgun and I found myself 
earnestly longing to be what he was.  I found myself dreaming of the day when I could 
seem the god that he seemed just then. 
With half slitted, laughing eyes, I superimposed my face onto his body and placed 
my mind within his, and I was suddenly satisfied to feel the dead weight of so many tiny, 
lifeless bodies hanging about my shoulders. 
Then I wondered...  I wondered about a great many bloody things that I had never 
considered before.... 

 

 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
43

 

D 

Descent 

How it drags you or it drives you, after a time.  How it flavors everything you 
taste.  How it colors everything you see.  How it whispers in your ears every waking 
minute of every living day.  How it lingers in shadow.  It is that you fear in the night.  It 
is that you dread before sleep.  It is that you must watch with curious, fatal eye and that 
you may never deny.  You cannot turn away, once it has drawn you. 
Breathe to blow it free, and it lingers.  Beat your heart to frighten it away, and it 
stays.  Walk to put it behind you, and it follows.  Drink to leave it in the dregs, and it 
drowns you. 
I have often thought that a man becomes a man only when he realizes he must one 
day soon die.  This event, this epiphany, above all other revelations, is what turns the 
mind of a boy away from boyish things and onto the deadly business of living to die.  It is 
the flip of a switch.  It is the peak of a climb.  It is a summit, from which heights all else 
is descent.  It is the end of all roads, at the very far away ends of it all. 
As a boy, I had seemed oblivious to its distasteful charms, yet, looking back 
through my memories with the timid flip of fading postcards, I realize how even then, 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
44
while I seemed unaware, it was there tapping at my shoulder, standing at my back, 
waiting at my heel.  It was monsters in the darkness of my closet.  It was severed heads 
tossed beneath my nightmare belabored bed.  It was the deep, green depths of summer 
pools when I swam too deep.  It was empty alleyways and the neighborhood bully and 
nowhere to run.  It was the thief caught.  It was the cheat betrayed.  It was the young 
lover exposed.  Always, however, it was there in some form or another.  My intimate 
partner in life. 
For even as I had been born into this world, its black, shriveled hand had been 
placed into my own.  It was my nether shadow to follow or lead, depending upon the size 
of the sun. 
When I was alone, it was there in my thoughts to counsel or be cursed, so that I 
was never, truly, alone.  When I was lost in doubt and confusion, it was the one 
cornerstone of certainty that should inevitably bear me up into some point of order, 
providing a landmark of orientation that was an undeniable, unmoving demarcation to 
say HERE, and thereby render all the unseeable, unknown reaches of my life into a single 
other quantity, that quantity being simply THERE. 
My own death, I realized as a young man, was the far member of this pair of 
bookends, me.  It was the terminus to my beginning.  As such, it must dog me in my 
journey from here to there.  It must ever stand before me, a pin’s prick of light at the 
tunnel’s mouth, a final doorway, a terminal stair.  It must be the carrot or the cudgel to 
lure me forward or beat me on.  It was the one event in all the world that was predestined. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
45
So it must drag me or drive me in all things.  It was the sad final descent that drew 
my orbit as gravity.  Patiently, it waited to devour me with its gaping maw, assured that I 
must enter into its jaws some day.  Some time. 
I lay in the half-light of that first morning in town, and I stared at the ceiling, my 
hands crossed behind my head, and I thought these thoughts.  I considered that perhaps I 
had made that plunge years back, even as I had suffered the first inkling of it.  I 
considered how it was possible that I had died, truly died, the moment I had realized my 
own mortality. 
For this was the ultimate beginning of the end.  This was the start of the finish.  Every 
moment in time that followed simply followed.  All that had come to pass since was the decline 
from the summit, was the downside of the grade.  After all, the waiting that precedes the end is 
nothing more than an extension of that end.  It is the prelude to the swan song.  Therefore, it is 
the swan song, itself. 
I sat upright in bed, propping the hotel’s thin pillows at my back, and I gazed at the 
shrouded window, as though I might witness the sunrise through its obstruction.  The forest, I 
noticed with an odd sense of dread, was quiet once more. 
No birds sang to welcome the dawn.  No squirrels chattered in joy to gather the day’s first 
fallen acorns.  The town was still and quiet. 
I heard no horns.  I heard no bells.  I heard no murmur of speech, or rumble of machines. 
Curious, I went to the window and swept its heavy, blood-colored curtains aside.  Unseen 
in the canopy, the sun was, indeed, on the rise.  The morning was fresh, the air heavy with dew 
and a scent of omni-present, days old death. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
46
All was still, save for a twinkle of sunlight that filtered in a slow pour through the 
treetops.  Sprays of it showered the town and splattered my face, leaving a dripping impression 
of my silhouette on the floor and the wall at my back. 
“Shit,” I grumbled, scratching my ass.  “So much for bad dreams.” 
A knock at the door startled me.  “Breakfast is up!  Be late and go hungry!” 
I jumped, and let the heavy drapes fall shut, stirring a choking shower of dust motes loose 
from their myriad perches, so they all plunged erratically down to die at my feet.  Trembling, I 
struggled to gather my wits, standing there half naked at the window thinking that I had not 
called for breakfast.  I said as much. 
“Don’t make a shit if you call’r not!  The lady of the house fixes breakfast but once a day, 
and if you’re late, you go hungry!”  Whereupon angry footsteps stomped away down the hall. 
Deciding this should be my call to arms, if any, I hastily dressed in the one change of 
clothes that I carried, and pulled on yesterday’s boots.  I followed those angry footsteps quickly 
to the stairs. 
Breakfast was a plain but filling affair.  I sat with a half dozen other apparent patrons at a 
large table, boarding house style, and was served up eggs and ham and biscuits with cream 
gravy. I swilled coffee like a drunk at an open bar, and shoveled the jellies with a table spoon.  
We ate willfully and silently together, none sharing their eyes, which suited me well. 
Grunting in a chorus, we declared breakfast well served and good.  Then we sat back to 
pick our teeth and sip our final hot cup, as the ‘lady of the house’, that woman with the black on 
black eyes, swept our cutlery and spent plates away. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
47
Footsteps descended the stairs at that moment, even as she cleared away the last biscuit 
and jar of jelly, and the other guests exchanged knowing glances and chortles.   This was, I 
guessed, a daily event, whatever was about to happen. 
Half-interested, having nowhere else to go and nothing better to do, I sat back to watch a 
small, thin, spectacled man cross the foyer and enter into the dining room with a blank, if 
amicable, face.  Upon seeing us stretched out before our empties, well fed and grinning to gloat 
over our repast, the little man came up short, and his face fell into a terrible scowl. 
“Jesus Christ,” he cursed, surprising me with his vehemence.  I was instantly aware of the 
little man’s danger.  He was of the kind that could sit a corner quietly for weeks of days and 
never say a word, then one day... SNAP, like a bolt of lightning on a clear day, he could be at a 
man’s throat.  “I thought I made myself clear yesterday.” 
“You make yourself clear every day, Francis,” goaded a large man from the corner chair.  
He was leaned back on two of the chair’s legs, his own legs crossed atop a low windowsill that 
let in the light as a flood.  “And every day you miss breakfast.  Haw haw.” 
The little man harrumphed, and straightened his coat, which little needed straightening.  
“I’ll just talk to the lady, then.” 
“Oh, sure,” chimed a second man, this one a thin man with a long, apple-knot throat and 
a beak nose.  He wore dirty overalls, and was apparently proud of his large folding knife, which 
he used with great alacrity to pare his fingernails into an empty saucer.  “You go on and do that, 
Francis.  See what that gets you beyond a lumpy head.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
48
They laughed.  Francis smashed his face together, and stalked across the breakfast nook 
to the kitchen door, and pressed inside, though not without some hesitation.  When he returned 
seconds later, his face burning red and his hands empty, they all laughed louder. 
“SOME men,” started the big one again, “Learn after a time.  A grumbling belly has that 
effect on SOME men.  Then...” he hedged coyly, ribbing the thin man with the knife, “SOME 
men ain’t MEN, at all.  Are they, FRANCIS.” 
Francis brooded.  Francis frowned.  Francis steamed in his own juices.  He was tense like 
a serpent poised to strike, and I didn’t think much of the big man’s intelligence, prodding the 
smaller man that way.  Guys like Francis, I knew from hard experience, were capable of 
anything. 
“Yeah, go on, Francis.  I bet you’re better in a kitchen than any woman, anyway!” 
The little man bristled, and walked stiffly to the table.  Where he sat to sip from a tepid 
cup of coffee, which he poured from the bitters of the last carafe on the table. 
“What were you back in the world, Francis.” continued the thin one, leaning close and 
folding his big knife obviously away.  “I bet you was some sort of bookkeeper.  Am I right.” 
“Something like that.” 
Now the big one bristled.  In fact, they all bristled, and a few hissed sharp whispers that I 
didn’t understand. 
“Now just you watch what you say, little man,” warned the larger man.  “We got us a law 
in this here town, and you just bet we take it serious.  Like no other law.  None of us love rules, 
but that one rule we all obey.  Even you, Francis.”  The fat guy drawled his name like it was a 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
49
defecation, the release of something foul and nasty and all but unspeakable.  “And we all figure 
you been here long enough to say.  Ain’t that right, fellahs.” 
The one woman present protested, and was included with a shrug.  Francis sat with a 
straight back and sipped his drink with straighter lips.  He fussed with the immaculate seam of 
his trousers, and I felt the intense absence of a morning paper. 
“The rule says,” he returned presently, when it became apparent that they were not 
simply going away, “That I have to speak the truth when I speak of it, but it doesn’t say that I 
have to speak of it, in the first place.  Frankly, it’s none of your fucking business, Vincent.  Nor 
of yours, Henry Lee.  Nor none of you.  So kiss my white, dimply ass.” 
They shook their heads and sat back again, as if in a dance chorus and this was their next 
step.  Money exchanged hands. 
“Not today, he says.  Maybe never, but I don’t think that’s right.” 
“He should have to say, like the rest of us done.” 
“What makes him so fucking special.” 
I blinked owlishly and tried to understand.  Francis focused on my confusion 
immediately. 
“Do you think it’s any of their fucking business.” he enquired sharply, his green eyes 
savage and mean behind the wire frames of his spectacles. 
I shrugged.  I felt his and their eyes upon me, and realized an answer must be made.  
“I’ve always felt like a man’s business was his own.”  Before he could swell up with a sense of 
victory, I added, “But then, a man can’t move invisible through the world.  A man must be seen.  

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
50
What is seen is known, no questions asked.  That part of a man, that part we see, is everybody’s 
business, I guess.” 
“Another vagrant philosopher,” he sighed, apparently exasperated.  “What is that 
supposed to mean to me.” 
I shrugged again, and drained my own cup of cold coffee to take my eyes off his.  “I 
guess these people seem to think that you’ve done something bad.  Only you don’t want to say.  
It’s okay with me, but I guess I think you must’ve done something REALLY bad, if you can’t 
talk about it.  That’s all.” 
“You would think that.  They all think it.  You should be no different.  Who the hell are 
you, anyway.” 
“Me.  I’m just passing through.  Like everybody else.” 
They laughed quickly, softly, cruelly.  We were all devils consorting in the half light of 
our own depravities, sharing a wicked joke. 
“Well, maybe it’s not so bad, and I just like to keep my business to myself.” 
Vincent made a wet noise with his mouth, and stood from the table abruptly.  “Bullshit.  I 
know you, Francis.  I know your kind.  I can guess what you did, why you won’t say, and when I 
find out the truth of it...” he trailed off, implying a threat as he stood there, leaning over the table 
and therefore the smaller man that sat before it. 
Francis was not daunted.  He turned his child’s face to the ogre’s with cold, flat eyes that 
frightened me infinitely more than Vincent’s bulging biceps ever could, and he said, “You’ll 
what.  What will you do, Vincent.  Hmmm.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
51
Vincent swallowed, and I thought he might have glimpsed the cobra lurking inside the 
burlap sack for the first time.  The one called Henry Lee cackled and slapped his knee, also 
rising, as though he might have business with Vincent. 
“There you go.  Hammer, meet the head!  No matter what else you say about him, girly-
boy or no, that there Francis is a spooky sort!  Ain’t you, boy!  You look like you just stepped 
barefoot into cold shit, Vincent!  What.  Nothing more to say.”  Henry Lee tugged at the big 
man’s shoulder, drawing him away from the table.  “Well, maybe you’re smarter than we all 
thought, after all.  Come on, let’s go.  We have work!” 
Grudgingly, Vincent went, but not without waggling a thick finger at Francis and 
declaring, “I’m going to the sheriff about you, mister!  We’ll see about this, one way or another!” 
The others grumbled their consensus, and all stood to follow the big man out into the 
foyer and, thereby, out into the day.  I was left alone with the angry little man. 
He eyed me silently for a time, and I returned his intent gaze measure for measure.  
Whatever he was, I knew myself.  He might be bad, but badness, like no other thing, is a relative 
concept.  It is subjective in all regards.  In all matters, it is comparative.  I felt that I had not met 
my equal here, save for perhaps in Bonnie.  This man was of a nasty and unpleasant sort, but he 
was not standing one wrung higher on the ladder than I. 
“Listen to that one,” he grunted after a time, sipping the last of his tepid drink.  “Him 
going to the sheriff.  You know what I think.” 
I shook my head, no.  I couldn’t guess. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
52
“I think he’ll be halfway through the morning before he thinks about what he said, 
that part about going to the sheriff, I mean, and that will piss him off more than anything 
else!”  Francis smiled a thin, mean smile, and I was assured of his sadistic nature.  “It’ll 
wear him all day like a pebble in his shoe.  He’ll work up what he should have said, what 
he could have said, and he’ll make a speech for our next meeting.”  Francis laughed, and 
stood, brushing his flawless lap for invisible crumbs.  “But it won’t do him one bit of 
good. You want to know why.” 
I nodded.  Sure, why not. 
“Because I’m going to kick him squarely in the testicles before he can open his 
mouth, next time I see him.”  Having gathered himself, he, too, started for the door, 
apparently anxious to get busy doing whatever it was that he did all day.  “I’ve had about 
enough of his shit!” 
He left stomping, grumbling something about rising for breakfast before the crack 
of dawn and eating green apples.  When I turned back to the table to push myself free, 
she was there, standing in the doorway to the kitchen. 
I felt her black on black gaze before I turned to see it.  It was the antithesis of 
light, in that it did not brighten where it fell.  Its attention was not warming.  Its touch 
was a subtle shift of shadows, and it came cold and grave. 
“You’ve made a friend.” 
I was shaking my head.  She added, “It’s like that here.  Everything is loomed 
together in a loose weave.  Everyone comes together at the knots.” 
I let a confused smile stretch my face.  She didn’t return it.  I felt her head must 
split if she were to try. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
53
“He’s an odd little guy, I guess,” I returned clumsily.  “He doesn’t really seem to 
fit.” 
Stiffly, her long black dress concealing the working of her body so she seemed to 
glide across the floor, she moved across the room to make the table.  “No, I suppose not, 
but then, neither do you.  Not like some.” 
“Some.  Like you.” 
“Like Vincent and Henry Lee.  I know their type, like Vincent says he knows 
Francis.” 
I scoffed with a sidelong glance and a rude noise from my mouth.  “That guy’s 
going to snap some day.  You watch.” 
“Of course he will.  Vincent will make certain of it.  It’s the way of this place.”  
She reached for the empty coffee pitchers, and caught me with her darkly alluring gaze.  
“It’s all little knots in the weave.” 
I couldn’t resist.  “Maybe we should weave a little knot of our own.” 
“In time.  Perhaps.”  I thought for a moment I saw the corners of her lips turn just 
a bit.  She would smile now, I fumed.  “You’re cute enough, but you’re unproven.  You 
might not last the week.  I like a man that lasts.” 
I actually blushed.  “Ooooh,” I breathed.  “You entice me.” 
“I’m sure.”  She stood with a pitcher in each hand, and I realized her apparent 
smile was a trick of the light.  “You should be so troubled.” 
She walked away.  I sat at the table a while, an embarrassingly long while 
actually, waiting for her to return, though she never did. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
54

 

E 

‘Ever Been To Texas, Boy.’ 

I found him lurking on the porch.  He hadn’t gone anywhere important, after all, 
despite his fuss and show. 
“She tasks me,” he gushed, when he saw me emerge from the hotel’s front door.  
“She tasks me as a mongrel dog driven with a whip.” 
I glanced over my shoulder self-consciously, and was certain that he knew what 
had kept me.  “Yeah.  She’s that kind, alright.” 
“They’re all that kind, if you ask me.”  He was furious, I could tell, but I 
considered that he was probably always furious about something.  “Do you know that this 
is the seventh straight day I have gone without breakfast.!  For being fifteen minutes 
late!” 
I shrugged.  I didn’t much care.  Not really.  I made a mental note to be on time 
for meals, if I wanted to eat, but that was all. 
“I hate this fucking place,” he spat.  “What about you.” 
I shrugged again.  “It’s done okay by me.  They’re fixing up my car for free, I get 
free room and board.  What more could a man want.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
55
He fumed.  “You’re fresh.  I can tell.  When did you get in.  Yesterday.” 
“I came into town yesterday,” I conceded neutrally, bristling just enough to let 
him know that he was fucking with a big dog in this fight.  “But I’ve been around 
awhile.” 
Unlike his attitude with Big John, Francis wasn’t quick to use his mouth on me.  I 
was happy, and a bit flattered, to see that he feared me instinctively.  Though I couldn’t 
possibly guess why. 
“Hey, no offense.  I’m just upset, I suppose.” 
“Hungry, too, most likely.”  When he glanced sharply in my direction to search 
out my mood, I cracked a short smile to show him I was kidding. 
“Yeah, damned straight.  I missed dinner last night, too.”  He sauntered over to 
the porch rail to lean against a wooden support beam. I followed disinterestedly, not 
having much else to do.  “This is a strange place.  You get the feeling, after a while, that 
everyone is a secret devil and that they all change into something at night.” 
I wondered if he had been listening to my own private thoughts.  My curiosity 
piqued, I asked, “Change.  Change how.  Into what.” 
He shrugged.  “I don’t know.  I stay in at nights.  Like the sheriff told me.” 
“Yeah, I got the same speech.  When did you get in.” 
“A week or so back.  I think.  It might have been a month or more.  Could be 
years.”  He shook his head.  “The passage of time in this place is queer.  Sometimes, it 
seems evening immediately follows night.  While at other times, the days seem to last 
forever.  I’m not talking about that sort of forever you feel when you’re taking a test or 
scrubbing a toilet, either. I’m talking about the REAL kind of forever.”  He shook his 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
56
head morosely, and I thought I saw his lower lip trembled just a bit.  Was he going to 
cry.  “Man, I really hate this fucking place.” 
Remotely, his remark angered me.  He seemed ungrateful.  “Then why don’t you 
just pack up and leave.” 
He laughed.  It was a sane, if bitter, laugh, but I sensed how the edges of it were curling 
with the slow peel of lunacy.  I was reminded of the old man at the lunch counter, and how he 
had laughed himself off that stool and out the door. 
“Right.  Why don’t I sprout wings and take a flying fuck at the world.” 
“I don’t know,” I quipped, leaning forward to rest my elbows atop the rail, feeling not a 
little bit ignorant.  “But I think it would be easier to just start walking back the way you came 
in.” 
“The way I came in.” he was incredulous.  “I couldn’t get back that way, even if I 
wanted to.  Not everybody drives into town in a shiny new car, you know.”  He was jealous. 
It was my turn to laugh.  “Neither did I, friend, and I didn’t exactly drive into town.  It’s 
an awfully long walk from that bridge out on... what did the sheriff call it.... 241.” 
“You drove over the bridge.”  It was a statement, not a question, though it was a question, 
too.  He wanted me to reaffirm my story.  I did so with a nod.  “That figures.  It’s easy enough to 
get across coming THAT way.  Just try to go back.  Just try.” 
“Maybe I will.  Could be my car is already fixed and ready to go.  We could drive it 
together.” 
He brightened instantly.  “Really.  You’d take me with you.” 
“Sure.  Why not.  I don’t have anything you could rob me for, certainly nothing worth 
my life.  Where did you want to go.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
57
My words caused his face to fall, slowly, like a cake collapsing in an oven.  It shriveled 
and shrank in upon itself, darkening to spoil. 
“Never mind.  I don’t have anywhere to go, after all.”  He gathered himself into a wad to 
stalk away, stomping along the porch to the stairs, and down the stairs into the yard, then around 
the house and out of sight. 
“What the fuck did I say.”  I wondered aloud.  Some people just won’t let a man be nice 
to them. 
Then I turned my thoughts to the garage and my rundown Datsun.  Which way was it, 
now.  Shrugging and guessing, I followed Francis to the yard, but pointed my feet in the 
direction of the street, once I arrived there, and immediately took the wrong way. 
It was a pleasant walk, as far as walking goes.  The air was damp and chill with the 
morning, and, though it was clean and pure, it yet reeked of rot.  It was a subtle stench, a dead rat 
trapped in the walls, say, but it was ever there to easily notice.  I couldn’t really suck a deep 
chestful of air, the way the morning seemed to require, for the stink of it.  Yet, the sun shone 
through the treetops, splashing through the branches and pine needles to shower the Earth with a 
bright glow, and I smelled bacon frying and biscuits baking. 
After a block or so, I realized I had taken a wrong turn, as the shabby little storefronts 
gave way to shabby little houses.  I turned right to head north for a half mile, passing before a 
dozen or so small clapboard homes grown rife with weeds, windows heavily shaded, yards 
strewn with junk. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
58
The curb was cluttered with an occasional car, all of them ancient and battered, many of 
them stripped to the frame for parts and resting on rotting wooden blocks.  I wondered if this 
town had ever passed a city ordinance in all its long history. 
At the corner where I would turn back to the east, an ancient black man sat on the porch 
of a dilapidated frame house, gently rocking back and forth and eyeing my approach with 
unknown intent.  He was white haired and wrinkled from the press of years, and his eyes were 
watery and yellow at the whites, then black on black. 
As I passed before his front gate, he shouted rheumatically, his voice a toothless cackle, 
“Hey there, boy!  Come up the walk a ways, I got somethin’ I want to show you!  Hey there, I 
got somethin’ I want to say!” 
I stopped, and cast my glance back over my shoulder, to be certain he was addressing me.  
As there was no one else, I understood he must mean me.  Glancing this way and that along the 
avenue for traffic that would never come, I crossed the street and stopped at the gate. 
“What do you have to show me.” 
“Come on through the gate, boy!  That dog don’t bite!  Look at ‘im, for Chris’ sake!  
That dog couldn’t chase a snail across a windowpane!  That dog couldn’t hunt up a good place to 
sleep!   But come on through the gate!  I got somethin’ I want to show you!  I got somethin’ I 
want to say!”  He waved me forth with a heavily scarred and thickly veined arm, which I thought 
must have been most powerful in its day. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
59
Reaching around to the back of the gate, I found its little latch and pushed it open with 
the inevitable squeal of a rusting spring.  It snapped shut at my back with a sharp report, and the 
old, mangy dog at the foot of the steps lifted its torpid head at last. 
“That dog there,” cried the old man happily, his face a toothless mask of leather, “Come 
in with me some fifteen years ago.  That dog there was a good dog in its day.  Hell, boy, we was 
both good dogs in our day!”  He cackled and spat into a haphazardly grown rose bush that lined 
the front of the porch, waving me forth.  “And the thing about a good dog is this; you gotta keep 
‘em even when they ain’t good for nothin’ no more.  You gotta keep ‘em even when all they do 
is sleep through the day!  Like an old man, what you think.” 
I shrugged.  I stopped on the walk before the sleeping dog, which had returned its heavy 
head to its weary paws and closed its bleary eyes.  He motioned me forth again, and I was drawn 
to step over it to climb the steps. 
Once there, towering over him where he sat in his chair, his legs wrapped in a heavy 
blanket, I demanded, “What do you want to show me.” 
“This, boy!” he cried, rolling up the sleeve that covered his left arm.  Lifting this up to 
the light, he showed me a patchwork of scars, most old, some new.  I let my face wrinkle in 
disgust. 
“Why would I want to see that.” 
He cackled, and held his arm higher.  “‘Cause THAT, boy, is what you’ll be cravin’ 
before too long.  They all do, you know, and I’m the only one that has it!  The only one in the 
whole damned town!  Now, what do you think of that.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
60
I smiled, and leaned back.  “I think you’re cracked, old man.” 
He cackled again, and let his tattered sleeve fall to his wrist.  “Maybe so, boy, maybe so, 
but I been here fifteen years now.  How ‘bout yourself.  I done taken every way there is out of 
this town at one time or another, most more than once!  I done taken ‘em, I say, and I knows 
which ones go where!  How ‘bout yourself.  What the hell do you know, boy.” 
I didn’t answer.  He busied himself buttoning the cuff. 
“Was a time, boy, when I wanted out, and I used to get out now and again, too, I did.  
Some of the others found ways, you know, I’m not the only one, but I am the only one that ever 
made a map such as this!  You just walk around and watch.  You’ll see.” 
“A map.  That’s what it is.” 
“Why, sure, boy, sure it’s a map.”  He motioned that I should take the chair alongside 
him.  It was covered with brown pine needles and dust, having sat long unoccupied.  I brushed it 
clean, and sat beside him, mildly curious.  “You just try writing something like this down on 
paper!  Ha!  That old man devil, he likes his games!  He likes his games!  But he likes his flesh 
better!  That’s where he’s weak.  That’s his blind spot!  I done figured it out!” 
I sat back into the seat, let it creak and groan with my weight until I was settled and 
assured that it would hold.  “You figured it out, huh.” 
“That’s right.  I figured it out.  Me and old Jess, here.  That there dog is a good dog.  
Nothing and nobody could beat him in his day!  He could sniffle up a hair, a single hair, lost in 
the woods, and find the body what dropped it!  Faster’n a man could walk behind him.  That’s 
right!  We did it, more than once.”  He grinned toothlessly, and spat at the dog to get its 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
61
attention.  Dutifully, the old hound raised its wrinkled brow a bit to acknowledge its master’s 
whims.  “And when they came hunting us... when they came with dogs of their own... it was old 
Jess there, every time.  Every time he saved my old black ass!” 
I was skeptical.  “Why would anyone hunt you, old man.” 
“Mmm,” he mumbled toothlessly, turning his head to admire the sun’s shine through the 
treetops, “They hunt bad men, don’t they.  Bad men that run away with their badness.  
Something about the law makes one man want to cage another.  Jess and I never much liked 
cages.” 
“What sort of badness did you run away with, then.” 
The change in his demeanor was instant.  He bristled and swelled with an ancient 
strength.  His dog seemed to notice the change in him, for it let loose a low, menacing growl that 
spoke of danger. 
“Why you askin’, boy.  Why you care.” 
I turned a cold eye on him, encouraged him to act out his menace.  “Nobody said I do.  I 
was just asking.  That’s all.” 
He stewed and steamed a minute, but I didn’t let go his stare.  He was the first to glance 
away. 
“Hell, boy, what does it matter now, huh.  It’s been years since I was out there.  Years.  
I’ll never get out, again.  That part of it’s all over and done with me, now.  Me and Jess.  We was 
a couple of dogs in our day, though!  You bet.”  He eased up, and started rocking himself back 
and forth, the way he was when I had first seen him. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
62
“I seen you walking down that street,” he added wistfully after a time, “And I says to 
myself, ‘That there boy walks with a hard one!  Look’a there!  A man better be real extra careful 
around a boy like that!’” He cackled and slapped his knee.  “Hell, boy, you remind me of me in a 
younger day!  All cock-sure and ready for business.  Ain’t that about it.” 
I nodded.  I had no idea what he meant, but I could pretend. 
“Yeah, that’s it.  I know you, boy.  Better’n you know yourself, I bet.  I remember my 
first days in town.  I remember how it felt like coming home.  At first.  Then I remember how the 
years started strapping me down, little by little, until each day came like a punch in the face.  It’ll 
beat a man right down, it will.  You don’t know about that, yet, but you will.  All too soon, I 
think.”  He raised his left arm and waggled it before my face.  “An’ that’s why I wanted to show 
you, boy!  I wanted to show you the ways!” 
“Why.  I have no intention of going anywhere soon.” 
He cackled, and it was the sound of madness.  It reminded of the man at the lunch 
counter, again, and, when he turned his eyes to mine, I saw behind the cataract veil that obscured 
his fading vision a flickering glow, a blazing inferno in the distance of his mind.  It raged there, 
buried deep in his age, and it flickered to fail, its unwholesome fuel all but expended.  Shadows 
cavorted there regardless, I thought, happy to be burned alive. 
I shook my head to clear it of such thoughts.  Nonsense.  He was an old man sitting an 
old porch in an old chair.  Nothing more. 
“That’s what they all say, the first few days.  That’s what they all say, boy!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
63
“I wouldn’t know.”  Suddenly anxious to see to my car, I leaned forward to rise.  He let 
his scarred left hand fall upon my arm, however, and it held me with a surprising strength. 
“But I ain’t said what I have to say, boy.” 
Relaxing once more, I pulled free of his grip with some difficulty.  “I thought you had 
just been saying it.” 
“Hells bells, son, can’t a man make small talk.  What you got to hurry you along.   
Pressing business in town, I bet!” he cackled again, and returned to rocking.  He chewed his 
tongue toothlessly for a time, and I sat patiently waiting, bristling, wondering what it is about 
aging that drives a man to prattle and chatter so. 
“Well, now, let’s see...” he hedged, collecting his errant thoughts with an obvious effort, 
as though they were stamped onto little paper cards that had been tossed into the yard by a 
mischievous breeze.  “Where best to begin... not at the beginning... nobody’d set still for it from 
the beginning... but, then... Ah HA!” he surged forward, spitting into the rose bush again. 
“Now then, boy, where do you come from.  Well, I come from Texas.  Is there any other 
place a man can live, I mean really LIVE.  I used to say, and I still do I guess, that if a man ain’t 
from Texas, well, then he just AIN’T, that’s all.”  He chuckled rheumatically.  “Ever been to 
Texas, boy.”  I shook my head, lying.  “No.  Well, shit, I bet that’s where you went wrong in the 
first place! 
“‘Cause the thing about Texas is its law.  God damn it, you ain’t never been gripped by 
the long arm of the law until you kill somebody in Texas!  They got them proud Texas Rangers 
down there, you know, and that ain’t no TV show!  They’s REAL Texas Rangers that can hunt a 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
64
man up faster’n a hound! Let me tell you, the last thing you want doggin’ your trail is one of 
them boys!  Hot shit! 
“Now, then, like I says, the thing about Texas is its law.  You don’t get down to Texas 
with crime in mind, unless you pack a bag to stay awhile!  ‘Cause once they get a hold of a man, 
they ain’t likely to let him go any time soon. 
“So when you run in Texas, you’d best run hard and fast as you can; harder and faster 
than you would just about anywhere else.  So, any man that can run in Texas and get away, if 
even for a short time, then that’s a man whose hand I’d gladly shake.  That’s a man, I say, a real 
man. 
“I done run so hard and fast in Texas that I got away more than once!  Now what do you 
think of that, boy.  Not many men can say such and be honest!”  He paused to scratch his beard 
and rock his chair and let the rising light of the sun twinkle in his watery eyes.  “Still, it might 
have gone easier for me if I had let that Texas law bend me, the way it bends most folks down 
there.  I sometimes wonder what sort of man I might have been if I hadn’t stolen that first car, or 
pulled that first trigger, or taken that first fugitive step.” 
He drifted off, and I let him.  I was drifting myself, wondering the same things.  It was 
the dream of all guilty men, I decided, and an absolute waste of time. 
The old man seemed to draw the same eventual conclusion, as he started up again with, 
“But I did.  So I guess there ain’t no use in stewin’ on it now, after all these years gone by.  A 
man can’t tear down the wall he stands on, any more than he can make it lean another way, once 
its foundations start crooked.  Nope, I am that I am, and I can’t be nothing more. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
65
“Still, it was good days before the trouble started.  You remember.  Sure you do, ‘cause 
there’s always good days before the trouble.  Free days.  Days without that nagging conscience, 
if you have such, or that old man devil hauntin’ your nights.  As a young man, I was a good man.  
Most are, I suspect.  Until a man’s dick starts to grow, he don’t think of much outside eatin’ and 
sleepin’ and playin’ in the sun! 
“But once your pecker gets hard that first time, man alive, you sit around rubbin’ it and 
thinkin’ to yourself that your own dad never discovered a thing like it!  Pretty soon, you want to 
start sticking it into things... soft, warm, juicy things mostly, but any old thing would do on a bad 
day.  Then you find out that the kind of things you want to stick it into won’t have nothin’ to do 
with a man that ain’t got no car, nor money to buy gas. 
“So you get a little job, don’t you, to buy your dreams.  You work a while, don’t you, 
learning the shitty ways of a shitty way of life somewhere.  Greasing cars.  Washing plates.  
Digging holes.  Something nasty that pays pennies for all the precious hours of a man’s life, and 
you work that job a while, don’t you, until you come to a fork in the road.” 
He rumbled up a wad of mucous and spat it over the rose bush, into the yard.  I grimaced 
and turned to watch the day’s shadows crawl relentlessly across the street. 
“It’s a fork in the road that every man and woman faces at some point or another, if he or 
she lives long enough, that is.  It’s this way or that.  To the right, or to the left.  Work, or take the 
day off.  Pay, or steal it.  Truth, or a lie that seems to serve better. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
66
“As it happened, I chose this way.  I went to the left.  I took the day off.  I stole it.  I lied 
wherever it seemed the thing to do.  In short, boy, I made a business of badness, and was quit of 
all the average, every-day things that fill the lives of most folks. 
“I suspect you know how it goes.  The first time you get your hands on a wad of cash that 
didn’t cost you a minute of sweat, you think you stumbled onto a certain sort of heaven on Earth, 
and you can’t understand wantin’ it any other way.  Afterward, them folks that work all the day 
long every week seem like chumps, don’t they, suckers.  Somebody else’s boy! 
“While a bad man seems his own man, don’t he.  Owin’ nothin’ to nobody.  Free to go 
wherever, whenever.  Free!  Ha!” he made a foul noise with his toothless mouth, and cackled 
loudly.  “A bad man, free!  What a joke, boy!  Ever known a bad man that’s free.  It’s the last 
thing a bad man ever is!  But a young punk will never know it.  Even were you to shout it into 
his face, he wouldn’t believe.  That fistful of cash seems freedom enough!  Tell me, boy, would 
you have listened.” 
I raised my eyebrows to express my doubt.  “I didn’t, as it turned out.” 
“Damned straight.  Our kind never does.  ‘Cause it’s easy enough at first, so it seems the 
very thing.  Until you get caught the first time, they ain’t lookin’ for you.  They don’t know you.  
You’re just another face in the crowd, and that helps hide a thief, don’t it.  Until you get caught 
the first time.  After that, they come ‘round regular, don’t they.  Even when you ain’t done 
nothin’ wrong.  ‘Cause they know you for the way you went.   They see how you went left when 
most went right, and they mark you for it. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
67
“Anyway, they marked me.  A young black man driving a white man’s car, stolen out of 
his driveway that very night!  You bet they kicked the shit right out of me!  It’s a wonder I 
wasn’t lynched on the spot, but, like I says, the thing about Texas is its law.  They don’t like a 
killer down there, of any kind, for any good reason.  That don’t mean they would mind if a 
young, guilty nigger accidentally fell down the steps several times, though!” He cackled and 
waved his shriveled arms about.  “I lost more than one tooth that day, let me tell you! 
“In the end, though, they held me over for trial after the dust settled, and give me one, 
too.  Then sent me straight along to Huntsville.” He spat vehemently, and turned those burning 
eyes on me again, so I could see his angry wraiths running from the flames of his madness.  
“And that were Huntsville fifty years past, before them Democrats cleaned it up!  Hot shit, boy, I 
wished they had killed me, then.  Nothin’s harder, I don’t think, than bein’ a black man sent 
down to Huntsville of that day and age, and all them white bulls standing over me in chains. 
Chains, boy!  They put me in chains down there! 
“So I come to the next fork in the road, boy, didn’t I.  It’s the second branch for all bad 
men, ain’t it.  I don’t know what comes next for good men, ‘cause I ain’t never been one, but I 
know it’s the next thing for all that take the left way.  It’s the path that says this way I’m willin’ 
to go back, and this other that says they ain’t ever gonna drag my dead body back to that place 
again.  Not for the love of God or Jesus or Carl Perkins, himself! 
“It’s a particular choice, I think, ‘cause it makes the first man easier to catch and handle 
that next time around, while it makes the second mad-dog desperate.  Don’t it. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
68
“A man that ain’t goin’ back, ain’t goin’ back.  It’s that simple.  You come to take his 
freedom, well, then you come to take his life.  That’s never an easy thing, taking a man’s life.  
Even when he’s sleepin’ and unaware, killin’ a man is never easy.  It’s quite a climb, ain’t it, just 
gettin’ up the nerve to think of it, really think of it, I mean.  I don’t guess it’s such a hard walk 
after that peak, though.  Once you decide to do it, doin’ it comes easily enough. 
“It did for me, anyhow.  It was cold.  Late winter, I guess, in Dallas.  Stopped on Oak 
Lawn, a red light flashing in the rearview of my latest stolen car, a Vega it was, and me sitting 
there in the driver’s seat, a pistol in my lap. He sauntered up to the window, slow and easy like 
they always do, sure of himself, sure of that badge.  Only, coming to take away a man’s life is a 
game of doubt, if it’s anything, ain’t it, boy.  Anything and everything can and will go wrong!  If 
you come to take a man’s freedom, to take his life, you had best come full on, head down, fists 
ready for trouble.  Don’t you think. 
“I always thought it foolish of him, really.  Him being the professional peace officer, and 
all.  He, most of anybody, should have realized that a cold stop in the dark like that is a 
dangerous thing. 
“Still, he walks up on my side, slow and easy, his hands nowhere near his weapon, you 
see.  When he gets close enough, why I just let that pistol up a bit in my lap and POP! POP! 
POP! I guns him down on the street.”  He chewed his tongue silently a moment, then spat into 
the rose bush again.  “Now, what do you think about that, boy.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
69
“I think you’re full of shit, old man.”  I said it gently, though.  I believed him, I suppose, 
but I didn’t much care what all he had done.  I had my own ghosts to wrestle, and couldn’t help 
him with his. 
“Yeah, maybe.  Maybe so, but this here says I ain’t!” he raised his left arm.  “That, and 
the fact I’m still here, and never was fried in no Texas electric chair, nor jabbed with one of them 
damned needles!” 
I shrugged.  “Maybe you never did anything to deserve it.  Maybe you never killed 
anybody.” 
That struck him oddly.  His head snapped around, and he examined me intently.  Then his 
face balled up in a wrinkled knot, and he started laughing so hard I thought he might choke on 
his own tongue. 
“Shitfire, boy, that’s the damned awful stupidest thing I ever heard ANYbody say!  Jes-us 
Christ!” he sputtered and hacked and coughed and doubled over in his chair.  I thought he must 
expire at any moment, but he managed to survive the experience to suck a long, gargling breath 
when he was finished.  He added, “But I guess you’re allowed that, you being new in town and 
all.  How could you know.” 
“Know what.”  I was becoming exasperated with him, and I was wondering if something 
in the water had twisted these people into the bizarre characters that they all had become. 
“Know nothin’, that’s what!  Now get the fuck off my porch!  Get the fuck off my street, 
boy, before I fetch my 12 gauge and bust a cap on your ass!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
70
Uncertain of his mood, I decided it was never wise to guess that a man was joking 
when he said such things, and I stood, climbed down the stairs, stepped over the old dog, 
and let myself through the gate.  As I crossed the street with the morning’s slow, sliding 
shadows, he cackled at my back. 
“Get along there, boy!  Me and Jess, we’ll keep a cold, hard watch for you!  And 
you come sneakin’ ‘round here by night, boy, look out!  Just look out, that’s all!  ‘Cause 
the devil has his business, boy!  The devil has his ways!  An’ you dance to his tune, boy, 
you’ll burn ten thousand days!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
71

 

F 

Fix It For Free 

She was standing on the sidewalk around the corner from the old man’s house.  
Waiting.  For me, I suspected. 
She wore a bright yellow dress made of lace and little frilly things.  She wore pig 
tails.  She was missing her two front teeth.  She was eight years old, I guessed, though I 
was never good at such guessing. 
When I rounded the corner, her face brightened, and she skipped close.  A bicycle 
lay on the curb, its chain off. 
“Mister, can you help me.  My bike’s busted, and I can’t get the thing back on!” 
What is it about something nasty, I wondered, that makes it nasty no matter how 
well it’s concealed or how brightly it’s painted.  The little girl was something very nasty 
indeed, I thought, painted brightly.  Something about her struck me as ruined right away.  
Rotten.  Spoiled in unwholesome ways. 
“Sure,” I replied coolly, neutrally.  I let her take my hand, and I followed her 
along the walk to her tragically slain contraption.  “What seems to be the matter.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
72
“It’s broken, silly. See.  This thing comes off all the time.”  She pouted, and 
seemed certain it could never be fixed.  I couldn’t help but smile in the face of it, and 
stooped to make the repair. 
While I worked, she hovered over me, her head above mine, pig tails dangling, 
and she spoke of countless petty, girlish things that I didn’t half understand and that 
interested me not at all.  As I was rolling the pedals to get things back together, she 
finished with, “We could play a game!  Won’t you play a game with me.  I never get to 
have ANY fun!” 
I was suspicious, naturally.  I didn’t much appreciate kids, they were generally a 
pain in the ass.  I especially didn’t appreciate prissy little girls like that one. 
Nevertheless, I asked, to be polite and spare her feelings.  “What sort of game.” 
Whereupon she broke into a coy smirk, and rolled her eyes playfully.  “Oh, I 
don’t know... what sort of game do you like to play.” 
Its chain back in place, I upended the bicycle and set it leaning on its stand.  “I 
don’t play games much, any more.” 
“Well, I do!  I know lots of good games we could play!” 
She twiddled her pig tails and pointed her toe into the dirt, where she made 
strange patterns with it.  I found her to be the absolute picture of innocence, and therefore 
I found her to be absolutely corrupt.  Something was very wrong here, indeed.  I felt a 
sudden chill, and a sensation that I stood too near something deadly.  It lay so well 
concealed at my feet, I was startled to notice it at last. 
Unbidden, I moved backward a step.  My face wrinkled, as I smelled or tasted 
something foul on the air. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
73
“I don’t have time for games.  Sorry.” 
I started off in the direction of town.  She followed, rolling her bike at first, then 
hopping onto its seat to ride it in circles in the street beside me. 
“You’d better be careful,” I admonished, hoping she would soon leave.  “You’ll get run 
over, riding in the street that way.” 
She giggled.  “You’re funny.”  I decided to ignore her after that, but she wasn’t put off so 
easily.  Following alongside, she asked, “Where are we going.” 
Bristling, I replied, “I’m going to the garage to see about my car.” 
The little girl gasped.  “You have a car.  Will you take me for a ride.  Will you.” 
I sighed, frustrated.  “I don’t think your mother would like it very much.” 
She giggled again.  “Silly.  I don’t have a mother or a father.  I’m a poor little orphan 
girl.”  She said this last with tones of mock self-pity, as if it were the best aspect of her life and 
she thought she should pretend it was a terrible happenstance. 
“Right.  Well, I still don’t think it would be a good-” 
In that instant, the chain came free of the sprocket again, and she all but toppled over into 
the center of the street.  Jumping to her feet in the last instant, she tossed the bike to the 
pavement and stomped and pouted, a string of black obscenities issuing from her mouth with 
surprising vitriol.  For a moment, a mad moment, shadows ruled her face, and seemed to dispel 
the little girl’s mask to replace it with the black, hateful countenance of a demon.  Its nasty  
mouth worked feverishly to complement its frightfully expressive features, which gnashed and 
pinched and snarled as something too long teased and kept on a short chain. 
Horrified, I scolded her for her language.  She was instantly the little girl again, as though 
reminded of her audience, having momentarily forgotten herself. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
74
“Can you fix it for good, this time.” 
Shaking my head to clear it of surprise, I nodded slackly.  “Yeah, I guess.  We’ll take it to 
the garage.  I have some pliers in the car.” 
Smiling sweetly, she lifted her bike and waited patiently for me to gather my composure 
and lead her there.  We walked together without speaking, though she whistled happily.  All the 
while I was consumed with the suspicion that I was standing too near something most dangerous.  
I felt I should run, but chided myself that these were absurd thoughts.  I had been too long on the 
road, I thought, running too long.  I was tired. 
Still, I couldn’t forget the girl’s profanity.  I had not imagined that, at least.  Or had I.  I 
was beginning to wonder, as we rounded the corner and I saw a sign painted ‘Town Garage’.  
My Datsun was parked in the crumbling lot, its hood shut, its doors locked. 
“That’s your car.” she inquired in disgust, as I peered through the windshield with 
cupped hands.  “What a piece of shit!” 
Straightening, I cast a black glance in her direction.  “Pretty little girls should watch their 
mouths!” 
She was instantly demure and contrite, playing the part once more.  I wasn’t fooled. 
“Come on, kid, let’s get those pliers.”  She was reluctant to follow me onto the lot. 
Standing at curb, holding her broken bicycle, she cast many furtive glances in the 
direction of the garage and wouldn’t budge.  “I think I’ll wait here for you, mister.  If that’s 
okay.” 
I shrugged.  “Whatever floats your boat.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
75
Secretly hoping she would be long gone by the time I returned, I crossed the lot and 
entered the grimy little shop office.  Its walls were smeared with grease and dirt.  Nothing, 
particularly the ancient furniture, seemed clean.  All reeked of petrochemicals and stale exhaust.  
A little counter sat before the back wall, a pair of doors to either side.  The door on the left led to 
the garage, while the one on the right opened to a little office.  Securely shut and marked 
‘Employees Only’, no employees were present. 
The counter held nothing more than an old, chewed pen, a few scraps of yellowed paper, 
and a pair of nuts and bolts.  A little register sat on a desk behind the counter, but it was oddly 
smashed and dented, as though it had been dropped on the floor repeatedly. 
I waited a few minutes to be polite, then I called for Lester.  I knocked on the office door, 
receiving no answer.  Then I went to the exit that led into the repair shop.  The garage was dark, 
save for the light shining through the tiny windows set into the three bay doors, which were shut.  
A clutter of tools and tool boxes and half-repaired automobiles littered the interior, so it seemed 
a model of disarray. 
Impatiently, I pushed the door open to stick my head through the crack and take a look 
around.  The car nearest the shop, a 50's era sedan, bounced slightly on its springs.  I thought he 
must be working there, so I stepped into the garage and bent low to peek through the windshield. 
Lester was there, to be sure, and he was working, but not the way I thought he might be.  
I had started to tap on the windshield, but stopped.  I refused to disturb a man during such an 
intimate moment alone with himself. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
76
As I returned to the office, I heard his muffled, passionate voice call, “I’ll be with you in 
a minute!  Wait inside!” 
I wished he hadn’t.  I really didn’t want him to think of me in any way while he was 
masturbating.  It gave me the shivers. 
Presently, he entered the room, wiping his hands on a greasy red shop towel.  I tried not 
to think about what sort of filth he purged there. 
“What you want.” 
“My car.  Is it ready.” 
He growled deep in his throat.  “Mmm, hmm.  You that city boy, come in yesterday.  
Thought so.  Only a feller from the city would have the manners to interrupt a man without 
knocking!” 
“How the hell was I supposed to know you were whacking off.”  I demanded.  I was 
ready to punch him right in the teeth for making me feel so slimy.  “This is a god damned place 
of business!” 
“It’s the Town Garage,” he spat, rounding the counter to sit at the desk and scratch 
himself obscenely.  “I run it.  That’s all I know.  I do what I want here, when I want.”  He 
grinned a stained, toothless smile, and stuffed a wad of tobacco into his cheek.  “It’s the privilege 
of position.” 
“Yeah, right.”  I started to lean atop the counter, and stopped myself.  It was filthy 
enough to remind me to avoid it.  “Just tell me about my car.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
77
He raised his eyebrows to caution me.  “Don’t nobody order me around that way in my 
own shop!”  Tobacco juice sprayed from his lips as he blustered.  “I’ll get out there right now 
with a god damned air hammer and cut that car into tiny pieces!” 
“Okay, okay,” I placated, reminding myself that the services were free, after all.  “So I 
should have knocked.  Alright.  Now, what was wrong with the car.” 
“Nothin’,” he quipped, grinning stupidly.  “Needed gas was all!” 
I swallowed with difficulty.  It was possible, but I didn’t think it likely. 
“I had half a tank when I crossed the bridge.” 
He continued grinning and chewing but said nothing.  When I opened my mouth to 
prompt him, he cried out unexpectedly, “Gaff!  Get your tired, old ass in here!”  A clanging and 
banging of tools and cans followed immediately, and I suspected he had awakened someone 
lazier than himself.  To me, he added, “Maybe you did.  Maybe you only think you did.” 
Normally, I would have replied, but this time I kept my tongue.  “So it’s ready to go, 
then.” 
“Sure it is.  After you pay up.” 
The door to the garage swung open at that instant, and an old, wrinkled face poked 
through the crack.  Lester sat forward in his chair, so he could get a clear view of the old man 
over the counter.  “God damn, you stink, Gaff!  How long has it been.  Why don’t you hose 
yourself off in the alley sometime today, Jesus Jumpin’ Christ!  I thought I told you to get them 
tools picked up and put away!  I seen how you cleaned the crapper!  That ain’t gonna fly, and 
you damned well know it.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
78
Gaff flustered and fawned and hedged and hawed, but said nothing coherent.  He seemed 
ancient, and was perhaps fifty that looked eighty.  A large, bulbous nose betrayed his love of 
grain alcohol, and his yellow lips reeked of stale cigarettes. 
“You are the shit awful worst excuse for a human being I ever knew!  Hell, I’ve had dogs 
that made a better man than you!  What a waste of oxygen and shit!”  Lester spat into a trash can 
that was stained by his abuse of it.  Gaff shuffled his feet and hung his head.  “If it wasn’t for me 
taking you in like I done, you’d be out on your ass, eatin’ from trash cans and sleepin’ in the 
street! Now you get out there and run this man’s car around to the front of the shop right quick, 
then you get your ass back there and scrub that toilet!  It better be clean for eatin’, too, ‘cause I 
might serve you up a stew in it tonight!” 
Gaff dipped his head and said, “Yes, sir.  Right away, sir.” 
I watched him go and felt not a little bit sorry for him.  It might have shown in my eyes, 
too, for Lester grunted, “Don’t waste no dope on that one, mister.  He ain’t worthy of nothin’ 
more than the shit side of your shoe.” 
It didn’t make any difference to me, not really.  I only wanted my car, and there was that 
matter of money between us. 
I said, “The sheriff told me you would fix it up for no charge.” 
Lester chewed and grinned and spat and chewed.  “He would.  Awful nice of ‘im to go 
about offerin’ up a man’s business for little of nothin’.  Let me ask you a question, mister.” 
When he didn’t immediately ask, I prodded. “What.” 
“You ever seen a sheriff or his no good deputy run a town garage.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
79
Rolling my eyes, I conceded, “No.” 
“Damned straight.  No more than you’ll ever see ol’ Lester out on them streets struttin’ 
around behind a badge.”  Tossing his head, he seemed to consider that there were such fools in 
the world, however, and that they could not necessarily be blamed for their God given natures, 
no matter how flawed these may be.  “It’s probably a damned good thing, too.  All the cars 
would go unfixed, and all the law breakers would go unpunished!” 
He chuckled, which gave way to a low grumbling.  “Not as if there was law in this place, 
anyhow.  Not as if there were any cars to fix here, either.  Any REAL cars, I mean.”  Speaking 
louder and addressing me, once more, he added, “Now take that heap of yours, for instance.  Is 
that what they’re callin’ an automobile these days.  It’s like one of them damned ol’ clown cars 
you might see in a circus, this little bit of nothin’ cram packed full of people.  Jesus Christ!  An 
eighteen wheeler would make short, flat work of it!” 
I fidgeted and chewed my tongue.  “It gets me there.  At thirty miles per gallon.” 
“Hmm.  What’s that you say.  Anyway, let’s see... there’s the tow, and you know that 
ain’t cheap.  Then there’s the service fee to figure out what went wrong.  Then there’s the 
emptyin’ and refillin’ of the gas tank... comes to seventy five dollars.  Cash.” 
I blanched.  I didn’t have to check my pockets to count money I didn’t have.  “I don’t 
have seventy five.  The sheriff said you would fix it free of charge.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
80
“I don’t give a shit what the sheriff said!” and he slammed the flat of his hand 
down upon the ancient desk.  “I run this here garage!  I say it’s SEVENTY FIVE!” 
“I say I don’t have seventy five.” 
“Then I say I just got me a new car.  Such as it is.  I’ll sell her come Saturday, and 
take my cut out of that.” 
“Like hell you will.”  I sized Lester with a new eye, and decided it would be a 
quick thing to beat his face to a bloody mess. “I had half a tank when I rolled across that 
bridge.  I know it.  You said yourself you had to pump it empty before you refilled it.  If 
it was just the gas, then you’re full of shit.” 
He shrugged.  “It’s what made it run, that’s all I know.  So the tow, alone, would 
be fifty, and the gas another ten.  Then fifteen for figurin’ it all out and pumpin’ the tank.  
Comes to seventy five, no matter how you cut into it.” 
“It might as well be a thousand.  I don’t have it.” 
“Well, then,” he hedged, scratching himself and chewing tobacco with brown 
teeth.  “How much do you have.” 
“Not enough.” 
“How much, I says.” 
“A little over fifteen.” 
“That’s not much of a start, but I’ll take it.  It’ll hold the car for a week or so, until 
you can come up with the seventy five.” 
Through gritted teeth, I tried one last time.  “The sheriff said you would fix it for 
free.  I’m getting free room and board at the hotel the same way.  They didn’t give me 
any shit.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
81
“Yeah, well, let me ask you somethin’, mister.”  He grinned and spat.  “You ever 
see a hotel manager whore run a town garage.  No, sir.  No more’n you’ll ever see ol’ 
Lester strutted about half naked, turnin’ tricks in them upstairs rooms, neither.  Shitfire, 
the cars would all go unfixed, and nobody’d get laid!” 
“I could pay you after I get a job and get back on my feet.” 
“Credit, he wants!” shouted Lester sarcastically.   “Hey, Gaff!  You old fart!  Did 
you hear this character.  Come around the Town Garage askin’ Lester for CREDIT!  Hot 
shit, that’s a bad word, mister!  The worst!  I don’t even know what it means, as it’s one 
of them words thought up by city boys to screw a man, same as ‘compounded interest’ 
and ‘collateral’.  Blech!” he retched mockingly, spitting into the trash can and wiping the 
juice from his lips with the back of a greasy paw.  When Gaff shuffled through the grimy 
front door, he picked up a torn phone book, and tossed it at the old man’s head.  Gaff was 
too slow to duck, and he caught it full in the face.   “Hey, there, you old bastard!  In all 
the years you’ve been fuckin’ things up around here, you ever know Lester to give out 
CREDIT.” 
Gaff retrieved the fallen book by its torn leaves, and shook his head.  “No, sir.  I 
ain’t.” 
“Damned straight, and you never will.” 
Before the door could swing closed, I heard the little girl’s distant voice calling 
sweetly, ‘Mister!  Hey, mister!’ from across the street.  Happy to be distracted before I 
started busting up the place, and grateful for a moment to think, I went to the door and 
shouted, “What.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
82
“Can you come here for just a minute!.  I want to tell you something REAL 
important!” 
“I’m busy!” 
“It’s something REAL important, mister!  It can’t wait!” 
Lester sat up at the desk, his head standing stiffly at the top of his neck.  “Who the 
hell is that out there.” 
Seeing that it seemed to upset Lester, I stepped through the door.  She was 
waiting at the curb, one hand on a street lamp, using it as a pivot as she spun around it in 
tight, bright-yellow circles.  I shouted for her to tell me from there, but she shook her 
head. 
Only when I was standing in the street next to her would she say, “I heard what 
that awful Lester told you, and I thought you might like to know, you being so nice to fix 
my bike and all, that he would shit his pants if he thought you might go to the sheriff.” 
“Oh, and why is that.”  I didn’t even think about correcting her language. 
“Because, silly, Lester doesn’t like the sheriff.  Something real bad happened 
between them a while back, I hear.  Lester’s afraid of the old bull, and the old bull would 
just as soon split Lester’s scalp as look at him.” 
Scratching my chin wisely, I turned my gaze over my shoulder at the grimy little 
garage office.  I was suddenly seeing Lester in a whole new way.  “Thanks, kid.  I owe 
you one.” 
“Of course you do.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
83
Back inside the dirty little office, I stood at the counter and stared at Lester, who 
sat at his foul desk, acting for all the world as if I were invisible.  He scratched and he 
chewed and he spat, and he ignored me, until he could tolerate my attention no longer. 
“God damn, I hate that little bitch.  What’d she do.  Told you all about the sheriff 
and me, I’ll bet!  Ever god damned time I might make a little money, she shows up, 
twiddlin’ her pig tails and wigglin’ her toes, and tellin’ everybody off.”  He sat bolt 
upright to get his head above the counter and shouted through the closed door, “All 
because I won’t fix her god damned BIKE!” 
“Maybe you should.” 
“Fuck her, and fuck you, mister.  That little girl scares liquid shit out of me, I 
don’t mind sayin’, and I ain’t the only one.”  He brooded a moment, his brow a wrinkled 
blight of rotted fruit, those familiar flames burning from the depths of his gaze.  “It’s still 
seventy five, I say, even if you do call the sheriff.  I’ll tell that old bastard the same thing!  
I will!” 
I smiled.  I said nothing, but simply stared at him. 
After a time, he offered, “Fifteen, huh.  Cash.” 
I shook my head.  He clucked his tongue and cursed, and spat sideways in disgust.  
“Oh, alright, you little freak.  The keys are in it!  Get the fuck outta here!” 
“Thanks!” I returned immediately.  “But you’ll get your seventy five bucks.  First 
time I get it together.” 
“Yeah, right!” he called after me through the swinging door of his office.  “That 
and my right hand will jerk me off just fine, you miserable shit!  Fuck you!  Fuck you, 
too, little girl!  You ain’t foolin’ nobody!  NOBODY!” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
84
Somewhat skeptical, I approached my Datsun and lifted the door handle gently, as 
though it might be booby trapped to explode on contact.  It opened without incident, 
however, and the car started the first time I keyed it. 
I drove it to the curb to pickup the little girl, but she was gone.  The streets were 
empty in all directions. 
So I sat a moment, wondering what to do next.  I remembered the end of the road.  
I remembered what I had seen on the way into town, and I decided that I very much 
wanted to stand in that place and look back the way I had come.  Maybe I could get a 
quiet moment to think, and with a quiet moment to think, maybe I could figure it all out. 

 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
85

 

G 

Good Years 

The one thing my old Datsun had that I genuinely appreciated and that had never 
failed me was its stereo system.  I drove through town almost happily, a bass thump 
heavy in my chest like a second heartbeat, and the treble loud enough to ring my ears. 
Moving faster now, I could see more of the town.  Its many shops were 
uninspiring, and all but deserted.  A deep gloom hung over all, which was a shade deeper 
than that of a pine canopy.  It was... an invisible pall... an oppressive if unseen presence... 
a wispy vapor that reeked of something disgusting and that lingered as all unwholesome 
stenches must, clinging to the clothing and the nares and the tongue with the penetrating 
taint of a poison. 
I stopped at the central intersection of the town.  To the left, as I recalled, lay that 
ugly ironworks bridge and the way I came, and to the right, the end.  Of all roads.  Both 
behind and before, nothing, save apparently empty shops and shabby frame houses.  
Abandoned cars.  Strange, disturbing people. 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
86
I felt certain I would spin the wheel hard left and find a quick exit.  So I was 
mildly surprised when the wheel went right, and I drove deeper into the center of that 
strange place. 
The drive through town went quickly.  Passing through a final dilapidated 
business district and crossing a set of weedy railroad tracks, I was delivered at last.  It 
was a half-block street that made a dead-end before a large, luminous barricade, which 
seemed to be the one well kept structure in town. 
I stopped the Datsun at the corner and walked to the end of all roads.  I leaned my 
back against the barricade, and opened my eyes slowly on the road stretched out before 
me.  A black ribbon of mourning tied across the land, its serpentine length was 
periodically exposed through the canopy where it climbed distant hilltops, until it 
disappeared over the hazy horizon. 
From this vantage, I thought I could see the rusted icon of that ironworks bridge, 
standing above a sparkle of sunlight that must be a reflection of the water flowing there.  
Shading my brow with a cupped palm, I was certain I could see the muddy river and the 
grim bridge that crossed it. 
How close it seemed.  How far away it loomed. 
It was an anti-moment.  Nothing much changed that I could detect.  I was the 
same man that I had been in the middle.  I was the same man that I had been from the 
start. 
Above the sigh of the wind, I thought I heard the slightest draw and expulsion of a 
massive, reeking breath.  It was the slow, constant whisper of an unspeakably vast, 
slumbering beast.  Or the phased sigh of ten thousand smaller creatures, sleeping through 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
87
the day.  Sleeping, yet regarding me with brooding and bloody enmity from the 
concealment of countless half-slitted eyes that are glazed with dreams while obviously 
aware. 
How patient, fate.  How cruel and pitiless. 
A dominatrix to stand over me with the brutal whip of time, fate would beat me with it 
daily, relentlessly, each stroke the second hand’s unabated swing.  When I felt her absence, I 
could be assured that, like this sleeping forest, she was simply there waiting, watching, patient as 
the day’s slow crawl and assured as the night’s eventual fall.  Surrounding me in every regard, so 
there could be no escape or reprieve. 
We were lovers that had yet to touch.  We were all eyes and demure smiles, approaching 
one the other slowly, inexorably, step upon step with each passing day.  She awaited me 
dreadfully, arms wide in a ready embrace, my ultimate destination, while I was ever her doomed 
voyager, bound to her without deviation. 
I felt her here, in this place.   She was close.  Her first and last touch but inches distant 
now, perhaps hours away.  How I longed for her.  How I loathed her. 
She was the stink on this foul wind, I thought.  She was the brooding silence of this pine 
forest.  She was master of the vision that filled those countless eyes, which I could ever feel 
burning at my back.  She was a face of shadows wrought in the boughs and foliage, as articulate 
and threatening as the whimsy of the wind or my own imagination could render her. 
A particular shift of the shadows near the corner caught my eye.  Huddled into his 
shoulders, a squat man limped into view, as if called forth by my own unheard thoughts.  He 
seemed to notice my Datsun, even as I noticed him.  He stopped at once, and the motion of a 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
88
large, floppy hat betrayed the movements of his head, as he took a slow turn of the barricade.  It 
stopped where it came to me. 
Then he turned, and limped back the way he had come briefly, until he could lean against 
the cracked brick facade of an abandoned building that stood at the corner.  There he waited, his 
anonymous face shaded by the wide brim of his floppy hat, which regarded me ominously with 
its tilt and direction.  He was queued for his turn at the barricade, I thought, anxious to perform 
the same ritual in the same sacred place as had I. 
Frustrated by a lack of revelation, jaded by anticlimax, disaffected by the view, I was not 
reluctant to relinquish occupation of this shrine.  It had not served me as I thought it should. 
I had expected to peak a summit of some kind and find myself in easy decline.  I had 
expected an epiphany to fill my thoughts with the sort of understanding that leads the way, that 
shines to expunge the night.  I had expected relief from my pains and worries and fears.  I had 
expected... to change somehow, into something other than I was. 
Sighing leadenly, I dragged my gaze across the expansive view one last time, then started 
down the hill to the Datsun, carrying my visions of the endless road as a heavy burden to bend 
my knees.  It was the sight of all those countless miles that weighed me so. 
I had come to the ends of it all, yet I had not been transformed.  No, I had simply racked 
up a great debt of hours that was a bill of minutes, itemized in seconds.  I was charged with the 
days that had delivered me there, and faced with the days that should return me.  Nothing more. 
“What a waste,” I breathed softly.  A last glance over my shoulder revealed the barricade, 
standing as before.  Its implacable facade mocked me.  What had I hoped to find. 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
89
Just then it came, even as I laid my hand to the latch of the Datsun’s driver’s side door to 
leave that place forever.  A soft, lisping whisper that was the slow drawl of a rushing wind, I 
heard, ‘I know you, Johnny Bullet.  I know you well.’ 
My mind seized upon those words with a terrified start.  I felt my sphincter loosen to 
unbuckle altogether, and I fought to maintain my composure. 
With a slow, cautious turn of my eyes only, I sought out the source of this condemnation.  
Yet it came again, borne randomly with the breeze as whispers are wont to do.  ‘John-ny Bull-
et,’ breathed the forest, ‘I know you well.  I know why you have come.’ 
The dark man huddled at the corner.  Of course. 
He approached now, though his face remained unseen.  Crossing the street with an 
uncertain gait, a long, crooked arm stretched out before him to dangle an empty sleep and point 
out my face, he hissed, “You’re Johnny Bullet.  I know you.  I know you well.” 
I shook my head instinctively.  “Not me.” 
“Yessss,” he hissed, stalking closer to stand on the far side of the Datsun, pointing at my 
face, his own face marred by the shade of his widely brimmed hat.  “I know you.  I seen you 
play.  Lots of times.  I won money on you more than once, and lost it, too!” 
I lifted the latch and yanked the door open.  “You got the wrong guy.” 
“No, sir, I do not.  I know Johnny Bullet’s face.  Like my own brother’s, maybe!” 
“Good, but that’s not me.” 
“Like hell it ain’t,” he gargled.  “I been waitin’.  I been waitin’ for you, Johnny.  I know 
why you come.  I been... expectin’ you.  Watchin’ for you every day.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
90
As all guilty men must, I rolled my head furtively, curious to see who might be nearby, 
listening.  “Me.  Why.” 
“‘Cause I knew you would come.  You HAD to come.  I knew that, when you did come, 
you would stop here, first thing.” 
I scoffed.  “Even if I were this Johnny Bullet, which I am not, how could you know such 
a thing.” 
“‘Cause,” he growled cryptically.  “That’s what they all do, first day in town!” 
Suddenly very nervous indeed, I wondered who else might have guessed the same thing.  
“Ha!  There you go!” he choked.  “Thought so, myself!  That’s why I been waitin’, so I could be 
first!” 
“First for what.  An autograph.”  Humor the old bastard, I thought. 
He laughed, which ended in a fit of coughing.  Spitting to the dusty, little used pavement, 
he started around the car at a hobble.  “Yeah, that’s right.  Here you are, Mister Bullet,” he 
squeaked, mocking a small child begging for my signature, “Sign it ‘Johnny Bullet - Number 8’!  
Ha ha, what fun!” 
Gritting my teeth, and careful to get the door open and keep it between us, I snarled, “I’m 
not Johnny Bullet, old man.” 
He clucked his tongue, and waggled that pointing finger back and forth.  “Careful not to 
break the rules, Johnny!  Or they’ll send you back!  You wouldn’t like that, would you.”  I 
sucked my tongue and said nothing, yet I let my glare warn him against coming closer.  “But I 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
91
won’t tell.  Never.  I been waitin’ for you, like I said.  Why would I be waitin’ if I didn’t want 
something from you.” 
I shrugged.  “That’s a fair question.” 
“Yeah, well, that’s what I thought, too, and how could I get that something from you, if 
you was... incapacitated.  I couldn’t, that’s all I’m saying.”  The brim of that floppy hat rose a 
bit, and I thought I could see the outline of a square jaw and a firm mouth, which worked fluidly 
to form the words, “You can trust me.” 
It was my turn to laugh.  “Bullshit.” 
“Ha ha!  Yeah, well, you can trust me as much as you can trust anybody or anything in 
this place!  How’s that.” 
“Better.”  Suddenly anxious to be somewhere else, I leaned into the Datsun.  Slamming 
the door shut, I stuck my head through the open windshield.  “Nice talking to you,” starting the 
engine. 
“Wait!” he belched, laying his hand to the hood, as if he might hold the car in place.  “I 
been watchin’ an awful long time, Johnny!  That ought to be worth a few minutes of your 
attention, at least!”  When I shifted into reverse and started backward down the cul de sac, he 
limped after, scratching at the faded finish with long, yellow nails.  “Wait!  Wait!” he cried 
harshly, his voice a grate of sliding gravel, his claw-like hand scrabbling over the hood 
ineffectually.  He kicked at the bumper as it swept past, and nearly toppled to the street from his 
own awkwardness.  “God damn it, Johnny!  You need me!”  I stopped in the cross street, and 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
92
spun the wheel, gassing the Datsun around in a tight circle.  “At least offer me a ride!  That’s the 
least you could do!” 
I stopped, sighed, and leaned across the passenger seat to push the passenger door open.  
Cackling, he limped around and climbed inside. 
“God!” I gasped, “You stink!” 
“Yeah,” he grunted, slamming the door and arranging his bulky black clothing and 
tossing back his broad hat.  “I know.  Been a long time in the sun!” 
“Or a high pile of shit!” I spat, holding my nose.  “This is going to be one short fucking 
ride, old man.  I-” but I couldn’t finish. 
I had turned to see his face, exposed as it was now by the absence of that floppy hat.  It 
was a broad, open face of bronzed, leather skin, thick brows and sharp blue eyes.  He smiled with 
a row of uneven yellow teeth that were gapped at top center, and right away I knew him.  I 
couldn’t recall his name, but I knew him. 
“You!” I gasped, repelled more by his face than his stench.  “What are YOU doing here.” 
“Same as you, my friend.  Looking for a place to hide.” 
The brakes worked surprisingly well.  My abrupt stop sent his head slamming into the 
windshield.  Rubbing his bleeding nose, he grinned crookedly. 
“Been a long time, Johnny Boy!” 
My mouth worked uselessly for a time.  I wanted to say so many things, and couldn’t.  
“Jesus,” I gasped, “I haven’t seen you since... since...” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
93
“Your days at the university, right, Johnny.  Say, weren’t them the good ol’ days.”  He 
licked the blood from his fingers obscenely, and I struggled to keep my breakfast. 
“They fired you.” 
“Yeah, sure as shit.  I guess I had it comin’, too, didn’t I.  Didn’t I.” 
I nodded and shook my head simultaneously.  “I can’t believe it’s you.  You look really... 
bad, man.” 
He leaned his head out the window to stare at the sun through the treetops and let his 
bleeding sinus drain down his throat.  “What can I say.  It’s been a long time.  A long, hard time.  
They sent me to prison.  Did you know.  Five years.  A living hell for a white man, let me tell 
you.”  Pinching his nose, he honked, “And there you were, all the time, on TV.  First college 
games, then the pros.  I watched you every chance I got, whenever the niggers would switch to 
the game and keep quiet long enough to hear the score.  Hot.  The hottest!  Johnny Bullet, they 
called you, right.  Am I right.  It IS you, isn’t it.” 
I thought he might cry.  So I nodded gently, and shifted back into gear.  “Yeah.  It’s me.” 
“Ha ha!  Thought so!  Can’t fool me!”  He shook his head and the blood flew.  “I would 
have spotted you right off, only...” 
“What.” 
“Only… well, this ain’t much of a car, Johnny.  Not for no superstar like you!  I expected 
somethin’ nice, really nice, you know, like a Jag or a Beamer or... somethin’.” 
“This car has memories.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
94
“Yeah, I hear you, Johnny.  We got to keep our memories close, don’t we, ‘cause in the 
end that’s all there is.  Ain’t that the shit.  Nothin’ but memories.  In time, everything’s a 
memory, I guess.  Or forgotten.  If a man knew that, I mean REALLY knew that when he was 
startin’ out, I bet he’d be a lot more careful about the sort of memories he gathered, wouldn’t he.  
He’d be a lot more selective about the things he forgot, but nobody could ever forget Johnny 
Bullet, could they.”  He shook his head again to pontificate. 
“Hey!” I shouted, disgusted to feel a droplet strike my arm.  “Don’t do that again, or 
you’re out, I don’t care who you are!” 
“Okay, okay, Johnny.  No sweat!  No worries!”  He lay his head back out the window as I 
started off, to let the wind suck a fine dust of silt from his tangled locks.  “Nope, nobody’s ever 
going to forget you, man!  Which is why I was so surprised to hear you had run, and why I was 
more surprised to hear you hadn’t been caught!  That’s got to be drivin’ somebody NUTS!” 
I grimaced.  “I’ll bet.  Where are you going, anyway.” 
He shrugged, and sat up straight again, touching his nose and sniffing tentatively to be 
certain he had stanched the disturbing flow.  “Hey, Johnny, I’m goin’ wherever you are.” 
“No, you are not.  You’re going about a block.  Maybe not even that far, if you don’t start 
talking.” 
“Sure, Johnny, I’m your boy!  I got your back!  When did you get in.  Yesterday.  Day 
before.  It was yesterday, right.” 
“Right.” 
“Ha ha!  Told you!  Huh.  It’s what they all do, first day in town.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
95
“I said I came in yesterday.” 
“But yesterday don’t count.  Yesterday you woke up somewhere else.  Today is your first 
day in town!” he spat a bloody wad out the window, and watched its diminishing arc with a 
curious intensity.  “And there you were at the barricade, pretty as you please!  But this piece of 
shit really threw me, Johnny!” 
“You can walk, if you don’t like it.” 
“No, I like it fine.  Just fine.  It runs, anyway, but, Johnny... really, couldn’t you have 
picked something a little...” 
“Flashier.  Just what I needed, you asshole, like I needed a big sign with my name on it.  
Besides, I told you this car has memories.  I couldn’t afford anything better when I got it, and it 
stood up well.  It’s carried me over a lot of miles.” 
He grunted.  “I bet.  It must have, ‘cause you’re here, ain’t you!.  All them miles, they’re 
really showing now!  Is that feet I smell.” 
“How can you smell anything, you filthy prick.” I demanded, vaguely insulted and 
tempted to hit those brakes again.  “And, like you said, I’m here, right.” 
“Right!  Right!  No denyin’ that, for a fact!  Here you are, and me in the same car with 
you.  Sittin’ right next to you.  At last.  After all these years.  It’s kind of a homecoming, ain’t 
it.” 
“For you, maybe.”  I reached for the handle to roll down my window further, but it was 
already at the bottom.  “For me, it’s like a long day at a city dump.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
96
“Ha ha, you always had a way with comebacks like that, Johnny!  Such a smartass they 
never saw at U of T, huh.  Even for a whole state of smartasses!  And them college boys, ha ha, 
chokin’ all over themselves every time Johnny Bullet walked into the room, unable to speak a 
single one of them big words they all learned so well!  You were like... like a god, Johnny!  
‘Cause you had it ALL, man!  You had the ball!  You had the smarts!  You had the women!  
How many jocks can claim your record on the field and in the classroom.  How many guys 
scored like you scored.  Huh.  And then...” he drawled dramatically, fading to a sullen stillness. 
“And then what.” I prompted, leaning half out the window to breathe fresh air, though it 
was fresh with the reek of death. 
“Then the pros, huh, Johnny.  Playing for Houston, far from home.  Never a day of snow, 
right!  Never a day of ice!  Not like back on the farm!  Just days and days of spring and summer 
and blondes with great, big, bouncy knockers!  Oh, Lord God, I love them Texas women!” 
I couldn’t help the smile that warmed my face.  “Yeah, they’re something extra special, 
alright.” 
“That’s what I’m sayin’.  You was glad you came south, wasn’t you.  All them years 
musta been GOOD years, Johnny.  I bet they was like... like a dream come true.  Right, Johnny.  
How many men can say they lived a dream come true.  I mean, really SAY it, you know.” 
“They were some good years.” 
“‘Course, I wouldn’t know, on account of what happened to me just after you graduated.  
Did you hear about any of that over to Houston.  Austin’s not such a drive, is it, that you didn’t 
hear anything, at all.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
97
Grimacing, I smacked a foul taste from my mouth.  “Yeah, I heard about it, old man.” 
“A bigger crock of shit did you ever see.  They crucified me, that’s what they done!” 
I was reminded of the old man down the street.  “Yeah, well, if you have crime in mind, 
they say you should stay out of Texas.” 
“Ha ha!  So right!  So right!” he snorted up a wad of mucous and blood and spat it out the 
window.  “That beast chewed me up, ground me through its guts five years straight, then shat me 
out the other end like a shriveled up turd.  You ever been gang-raped, Johnny Boy.  Huh.  What 
fun!” 
“I’ll bet.” 
“I was bein’ sarcastic, you know!  They had to sew up my asshole twice while I was 
there!  What do you think about that.” 
I shrugged, and turned a cold, hard eye on him.  “I think you got what you deserved.  
They were just kids.” 
He was unashamed.  “I can’t be sorry for somethin’ I didn’t do!” 
“They had your sperm, as I recall.  DNA is never wrong.” 
“I don’t know about none of that, all I know is, they crucified me.”  He seemed ruffled, 
and smoothed himself with nervous movements of his hands. 
“I don’t know,” I offered snidely, “Five years sounds pretty light for what you really did.  
I don’t think they should have offered you a plea bargain.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
98
“But they did!  Know why.  Don’t you want to know why.  ‘Cause it was all bullshit, 
that’s why!  Them girls and boys didn’t want to get up and testify, ‘cause it was all lies, that’s 
why!” 
“Then how did your cum get into their panties and underwear.” 
He didn’t respond immediately.  “I have a theory on that, but we ain’t here to talk about 
me, are we, Johnny Boy.  We’re here to talk about YOU.” 
“So talk, and make it quick.  You’re running out of time.” 
“Oh, you’re tough enough, ain’t you, Johnny Bullet.  Tough enough when it’s all easy 
and square, but when it goes south, you’re like everybody else.” He scoffed with a wet noise 
from his foul mouth, “Standin’ there on your mount to make a sermon out of me.  Well, what 
about you, then.  At least I faced up to a jury of my peers!  What did you do, but run.  Like a 
beat dog, you ran, not like Johnny Bullet, superstar.  With your tail tucked and your head down 
and your ears pinned back!  At last!” 
“It made a few people happy, I guess.” 
“A FEW!  Ha ha!  What a joke!  The whole god damned nation was watchin’ and shakin’ 
their heads and cluckin’ their tongues, like you done to me just now.  Imagine that, a hundred 
million hypocrites, all pointin’ their fingers at you!  You, Johnny Boy!  And not cheerin’, but 
jeerin’, huh.  And not shoutin’ ‘hoorah’, but ‘ho yeah!’, right.  So happy to see somebody like 
you fall so far, so hard, so fast!  So happy to know that you weren’t a god, after all.  That you 
were just like everybody else, capable of actin’ the animal any ol’ time.  Capable of murder, 
even! 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
99
“But, wow, when you do things, you sure do ‘em right, don’t you, Johnny!  Whether on 
the field or in a classroom or murderin’ folks, you’re at the top of the list, ain’t you!  Always 
with the highest score!  Touchdown!”  He laughed and shook with the hilarity of it all, raising his 
arms to signal a goal. 
“So glad I could amuse you.”  I stopped at that central intersection in the town, pointed 
toward the bridge, and I wondered which way I should go. 
“Go straight,” he inserted with a grunt, as if reading my thoughts.   I obliged, and he 
continued, “You know, if I was to bet, I’d say that’s the way they’re going to remember you, 
Johnny!  Not for all them touchdowns you scored on the field, but for that last, big touchdown 
you scored in blood!  You think.” 
“I think I don’t care any more.” 
“Bullshit.  Not you, Johnny!  That’s the last thing you’ll ever be, somebody that don’t 
care what others think.  You’re all that, or you’re nothin’.” 
“You don’t know me, asshole.”  My words sprayed between my clenched teeth, and I 
resisted the urge to pop him in the jaw with a quick right. 
“Oh, I know you, Johnny.  I know you well.” 
“Like hell you do, you crazy old bastard.  You don’t know me from a stray dog.  I’m long 
sick of your stink, and I’m fast getting sick of your mouth.” 
“Sure you are.  Sure you are, ‘cause I talk too fuckin’ much!  Always have, always will, I 
guess!  I’m like a damned woman that way.”  He cackled and dug a piece of grit from the bristles 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
100 
of his chin.  “Could be all that time in prison, you know.  Somethin’ about gettin’ fucked up the 
ass by a dozen buck niggers at once takes the man out of a man, you know, ha ha! 
“Hell, I’m glad you ran, Johnny.  I was glad to see you get away, otherwise they might 
have done the same to you, and that wouldn’t be... right, somehow. 
“But you can never run far enough fast enough, can you, Johnny.  Nope, ‘cause there’s 
always more of them than there is of you. ‘Cause they know you.   You, of all people, from all 
them commercials and promos!  Ha ha, what a joke!”  The foul old man puffed himself up and 
straightened his lapels with an air of importance, and, using an announcer’s bass voice, drawled, 
“Hi, do you know me.  That’s why I carry the American Excess card!  Don’t go homicidal 
without it!  Ha ha! 
“The one that spots Johnny Bullet and calls the cops!” he gasped, rolling his eyes to 
imagine the loot such an act of betrayal must produce.  “I bet that guy never works again, huh.  
So they’re gunnin’ for you full time.  Every eye in the nation, I bet, lookin’ for Johnny Bullet.  
It’s like... like... a lottery!  Who’ll be the one.” 
I thought I understood his direction now.  “You.” 
He waved me off and shook his head, “Nah, not me, Johnny!  I couldn’t turn you in, not 
even if I wanted, could I.  They’d keep me just as long as they kept you, maybe.” 
“Then what the fuck do you want.” 
“Want.  That’s a difficult question to answer.  It’s easier, I think, to ask what I don’t 
want.” 
“Well.  What don’t you want.” 

Good Years 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
101 
“Hmmm, now let’s see... I don’t want to die.  I know that much.  I don’t want to go back 
to prison.  I don’t want to get fucked up the ass ever again.  I don’t want a fat woman to sit on 
my face backwards and fart, ha ha!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
102 
I felt my own face sour, which only caused him to laugh harder.  I felt he had 
something relevant for me, otherwise I might have pushed open the door and kicked him 
out at sixty miles per hour.  Instead, I gave him the quick right to his jaw that I had 
considered earlier.  This shut him up and brought him to the point nicely. 
“Right, right, Johnny.  Like I says, I talk too much.  Like a fuckin’ woman, 
sometimes.” 
“Just out with it, already.” 
“Okay, well, it’s this.  They want to recruit you.  Like the good ol’ days, you 
remember.  You’re first round in the draft, Johnny Boy, and they’re holdin’ the first pick.  
They got their ticket on you, boy!” 
“They.  They who.” 
“Them!  Them that run the show, you know.  The powers that be.” 
“Who, specifically.” 
He grumbled and groaned and growled and chewed his tongue in frustration.  “I 
don’t know names, Johnny.  Nobody knows names, but they sent me to fetch you away 
from this place.  Jesus Christ Jumpin’ Jack, I can’t wait to get the fuck out of here!”   He 
shuddered to pontificate.  “This place creeps me out, Johnny!  I never thought I’d come 
back, once I got out, but, what can I say, when they call, a man comes runnin’!” 
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I’ve had enough.”  I tapped the 
brakes, and signaled that I was exiting to the shoulder.  “This is where you get out.” 
“That wouldn’t be smart, Johnny!  I told you, they want you, and you can’t say 
‘no’ to them, Johnny.  You just can’t, that’s all.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
103 
“That’s right, I can’t, asshole, because I don’t even know who they are.  Only you 
can talk to the figments of your imagination, you fucking nut!” 
The car came to a stop, and I motioned for him to exit.  Except, he wasn’t going 
anywhere soon.  “Don’t make me mess you up, old man, because I’m in no mood to be 
gentle.” 
“Johnny, listen a minute, would you.” 
“Stop calling me that, or I’ll break your jaw so you can’t talk at all.  You got it.” 
He blinked owlishly.  “What should I call you, then.” 
“Don’t.  At all.  Ever.  Just get out, and walk away.” 
“You ain’t goin’ to kill me, John- er, eh, mister.”  Something in his tone was 
genuine, but a deeper resonance in it spoke of mockery and insult.  I felt the last thing he 
thought I could do was kill him.  “You’re so young and big and strong.  I’m so old and 
wretched and worn-out.  Right.  You could snap my neck with a thump.  Couldn’t you.” 
He grunted and was smug and was going nowhere.  “Your ignorance is showing, 
Johnny Boy.  No, it’s best that you sit right there and listen, get an education.  You’re a 
newborn in this place, Johnny, and I been here a while.  You need me like you once 
needed your own mama.” 
I opened the car door with a quick trip of its latch.  Setting my jaw and the 
parking brake in the same instant, I reached across the gear shift to grip him bodily about 
the shoulders.  With a savage yank, I pulled him across the driver’s seat after me, and 
tossed him into the street, where he rolled to a stop in a heap of black rags near the center 
line. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
104 
He lay there in a pile, cackling madly or sobbing with a broken heart.  I stood 
over him, panting, my chest full of hateful, reeking wind, my fists clenching and 
unclenching as a tick. 
“Go on back to the hotel, then, Johnny!  Stay a while!  It’s a nice place.  Enjoy the 
scenery and the quaint folk!  Lay down some roots, why don’t you.  Settle down!  Ha ha, 
what fun!”  He sat up, dusting his rags like it might make a difference in his appearance.  
“Go on, Johnny Boy, kick the shit out of me!  Beat an old man to death!  I wish you 
would!  I really do!” he was laughing, his eyes squinted nearly shut, his smile a crooked 
waggle of missing or stained teeth.  “I really do, Johnny Boy, just snap my old neck!  Go 
on!  Ha ha!” 
A familiar light shone in his eyes then, which was the uncertain, fickle light of ten 
thousand bonfires burning across the horizon of his mind, marking a host of bloodthirsty 
lunatics encamped on the plains of his dark, brooding thoughts.  Shadows cavorted there, 
great winged forms of darkness that swept across the night skies of his eyes with the 
sable shapes of soaring serpents borne upon bat’s wings.  “Knock out the rest of my 
teeth!  Take an eye!  Break my arms and legs!  Hey!  You could use your tire iron, 
Johnny Boy, or, better still, your jack stand!  Hot shit, those sure make a mess of a man in 
a hurry, I bet!” 
“Shut up, fool!” 
“But go on, Johnny!  Do it quick!  Do it slow!  JUST FUCKIN’ DO IT!” 
No matter how he deserved it, no matter that he asked, I couldn’t.  He knew it, I 
realized, from the start. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
105 
Rising to his knees with obviously painful effort, he stood, and straightened his 
creaking spine.  “Murder’s a funny business, ain’t it.  In the first place, it takes a 
particular sort of man to do it, then the man takes to doin’ it in a particular sort of way.  
So it’s all very particular, right down to the last detail.  Usually.”  He hobbled to lean 
against the Datsun’s fender and pant, his breath coming quick and sharp between his 
words.  “One sort of man will kill hookers without a qualm, but wouldn’t touch a child.  
Still another would kill a man of any kind any day of the week, but would never touch a 
woman.  Still another only kills those that work in convenience stores, generally just 
‘cause they’re on the job, but wouldn’t kill anybody else any other time, and so on.  You, 
Johnny Bullet, you’re a particular sort of killer, ain’t you.” 
“I never killed anyone!”  Why was I arguing with this lunatic, I demanded of 
myself.  I slammed the driver side door on him, and shifted into ‘D’ for ‘Drive’. 
“No, not one!  More than one!  Many, many more than one, ha ha!  But not like 
some of them mad dog killers you read about in the paper, the kind that show up to work 
a day after bein’ fired.  Not like that, Johnny!  Better, ha ha!  So much better!”  The old 
guy genuinely reveled in it, I decided.  He loved it.  He would swim in the blood and guts 
of it, if he could.  “What a day!  What a week!  It’s a year to make such a scratch on the 
wall of time that no amount of forgettin’ could ever polish it away!” 
I had lifted my foot from the brake pedal to start off, but stopped when his face 
waxed suddenly serious and he reached back over his shoulders to pull that floppy hat 
down low over his very deadly expression.  “But that’s what you always wanted, wasn’t 
it, Johnny.  To be remembered.  To last forever.  To be... immortal.  Right, Johnny.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
106 
The Datsun’s motor hesitated when I gunned it, as if waiting an instant to catch 
his final words, then it jerked me forward, back down the road in the direction of the 
bridge.  On my way out, the same way I came in. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
107 

 

H 

Hand-Me-Down’s 

I saw a funny picture, once.  It was of three fishes, each swimming the same 
direction in a line, arranged from the smallest to the largest in order.  Each had its mouth 
wide open, ready to gulp the one before, so the big fish would eat the smaller fish, only to 
be devoured by a bigger fish still.  I always had an impression of a larger fish yet, unseen 
beyond the range of the picture’s frame, and beyond that fish, another larger again, so on 
into infinity, I guessed, like a mirror that reflected a mirror that reflected a mirror... 
The message was not lost on me, and I tried to imagine where it might end.  I 
realized that it did, in fact, have an end.  Life was not an infinite spread of reflections, it 
couldn’t be.  There must always be an apical beast, the top animal to eat all the lesser 
animals beneath it.  The tiger in the jungle.  The shark in the sea.  Man, everywhere else. 
So I thought after a time that I would decide where in this chain I should best fit, 
and that I should go about arriving there in the most efficient manner possible.  Even as a 
very young man, I understood this. 
After much dubious and thoughtful consideration, it came to me that I should be 
the apical animal, if I were to be anything, at all.  I should be the top branch of the tree. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
108 
If humankind dominated this world, and thereby this solar system and possibly, 
though doubtfully, the universe by default of its alleged emptiness, then I vowed I should 
dominate humankind.  On whatever level was available to an Iowa farm boy, stripped of 
his lands.  To do anything less, to pursue baser aspirations, I decided, was to admit that I 
was what the world had fashioned me to be. 
I decided that I was not a farm boy from Iowa.  I decided that I did not like 
shoveling snow or skating on icy ponds, bundled up like a marshmallow man.  I decided 
that I did not like shooting small creatures with cruel shotguns and swilling beer over 
their dead bodies like a boorish Neanderthal set loose on the night.  I decided that I did 
not like having to wear my cousin’s hand-me-down clothing, that were his hand-me-
down’s from two brothers up.  I decided that I did not like going hungry, that I did not 
like going without, that I did not like being less than, laughed at, ridiculed, pointed out, 
held up, set as an example.  I decided I didn’t like much of anything about Des Moines, 
Iowa or that shitty little farm that was a thousand things to do and never enough sunlight 
to do them. 
I decided there were ways out, and that I should be able to figure a way for 
myself, if I was smart enough.  I realized that the way to get smart enough was laid out 
before me.  Elementary education was mandatory.  I decided I would learn, and that I 
would learn better than anybody ever learned, that I would learn everything. 
As with all things of this nature, as I matured and learned enough, I realized that 
there was an end to the public dole, same as there was an end to the feeding chain.  
Education was money, which meant that only the moneyed could get an education.  I was 
not moneyed.  My family was poor, and made poorer when the bank took the farm. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
109 
Still, I decided there must be a way.  If a man is smart enough, he can figure 
anything, all he needs is the right information. 

Johnny Bullet 

 

Stephen Huff 
110 
One day, as it happened, I learned a word.  A key word, of the sort that can 
profoundly change a man’s life with its meager definition.  I learned the word 
‘scholarship’.  I learned there were many different kinds of scholarships offered to all 
kinds of people from all kinds of organizations, entities and private individuals.  I learned 
that the most profitable of these were generally sports scholarships.  More specifically, 
these were football scholarships.  
I knew nothing about the game, though, and it was high school by then.  Still, it 
was just a game, if a physical one.  I was big enough, I knew, bigger than most, and I 
enjoyed running, so I decided it would be easy. 
When I signed up, they tried me out and assigned me to the third team, if only 
because there weren’t enough players to cut.  Like my every other endeavor, I learned.  I 
learned well and I learned quickly.   I learned to throw and catch and, most telling, I 
learned to love the pain.  My pain.  Their pain.  Everybody’s pain.  I learned that the key 
to the sport was raw aggression and savage physical violence.  I learned to own the field 
at the expense of another’s fear. 
In turn, my opponents learned to fear me.  Mortally, some of them, because they 
got out of my way fast enough most of the time. 
I hit the field with the anger of murder burning in my heart and the light of 
madness flaring in my eyes, and I hurt as many of the other players as I could, first thing 
in the game.  After I laid a few of their biggest guys out, I had the run of the field.  It was 
easy to rack up a score after I confronted them with their own horrible mortality. 

Johnny Bullet 

 

Stephen Huff 
111 
By graduation, I had the best stats in the state for my division.  I collected the 
offers for six months, before I opened even one.  The recruiters were nuts by May.  One 
by one, I sorted them out, this one, that one.  Into two piles, initially. 
Into this pile, I tossed locations that reported more than an inch of snow annually.  
All these went immediately into the trash, including several prestigious ivy league 
schools.  Of the rest, I made several smaller piles, sorting them down to just two within 
half an hour. 
At this point, the decision was made by the style of car I would drive.  Austin 
made the right selection.  They presented me with a sparkling new Datsun coupe.  I smile 
to think of it, shining in the sun.  I remember thinking to myself that my father had never 
had something so fine!  Better, it was mine.  Just for being me.  John Stevenovitz, from 
Des Moines, Iowa. 
Oh, I wasn’t Johnny Bullet then.  Not then, but I would be.  Eventually. 
Stevenovitz doesn’t fit well on the back of a jersey, after all.  It has no snap.  
That’s what the public relations guys say, anyway.  I wasn’t overly fond of it, so I 
changed it one afternoon.  That simple. 
My father, my step-father I mean, and my mother were years dead, then.  Nobody 
else mattered, except me.   As far as I was concerned, a name is nothing if it isn’t 
stamped with a crest into golden ingots or hanging over the doorway of a palace.   My 
name, the name Stevenovitz, I mean, was nothing so nice.  It reeked of plain, black dirt 
and corn.  It spoke of long, hot summer days in the fields, and of long, cold winter nights 
in the barns.  It spoke of knee deep shit, of mud deeper.  It spoke of sweat and blood and 
tears, all shed vainly in the name of pride. 

Johnny Bullet 

 

Stephen Huff 
112 
I say, fuck pride.  It stands in the way.  Like conscience and remorse and sorrow 
and guilt and shame and selflessness, it hinders destiny.  It curbs the flow of a man’s 
ambitions and stems the tide of his dreams.  Pride restricts a man much more cruelly than 
steel bars ever could. 
Pride was the family farm, gone to seed for lack of equipment, and the equipment 
gone to auction for lack of credit, and the credit gone bad for lack of money, and the 
money run out for lack of crops, and the crops unplanted for lack of equipment.  It was 
the rise and the set of a sun.  It was the ascent and descent of a moon.  It was a planetary 
orbit to make a year. 
It was a harsh wheel to grind a man down, pride.  It was my father, my step-father 
I mean, bending to break where his ideals grated against its punishing disciplines.  Pride 
was that old man standing at the drive to our old farmhouse, shotgun laid across his 
forearms, and a strange light shining in his eyes.  Pride was the foam that speckled his 
lips as he raged madly at the men come to take it all away by the letter of law. 
Pride was his brains strewn across the lawn and his blood gelling in pools about 
his sprawled body.  I say, it stands in the way. 
It was a proud name, Stevenovitz, but it was nothing further.  Pride, of itself, is an 
empty thing.  Of itself, pride signifies nothing and lacks all meaning.  Alone, it is simply 
one of the uglier aspects of human nature. 
So I shed it with my name.  I became a piece of plastic, a store-bought thing. 
I became Johnny Bullet.  Straight down the fucking middle.  Right across the line.  
I became the personification of the All American.  If I was a light, I shined bright as the 
sun. 

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Stephen Huff 
113 
When I graduated with honors, the pros were long lined up, drooling.  Offers were 
forced into my hand as I walked the campus.  Letters of contract were slipped beneath my 
dormitory door at night, and awaited my rise most mornings.  My mailbox was filled 
daily with solicitations. 
As before, I sat down one day with a huge pile of them all at once, and I sorted 
them, one by one, until I had two smaller stacks.  Everything north of the line went 
straight south into my trashcan.  Of the rest, it was a matter of dollars and cents. 
I remember reaching for the winner that afternoon.  I recall how I lifted it to my 
lips to kiss it, then to my nose to catch its scent.  It was the smell of money.  Of power.  
Of everything that a Des Moines farm boy could never be. 
A single thought filled my mind for a long moment.  It was, ‘Johnny Bullet, 
you’re going to live forever!’ 

 

Johnny Bullet 

 

Stephen Huff 
114 

 

I 

I 

I was one with the white line again.  It was a comforting presence at my elbow, an 
old friend to run along beside me, reminding of the way, remembering where we had 
been.  It was the road’s voice to speak to me with the dots and dashes of obscure Morse. 
I followed it along through the forest, listening with my eyes.  It had seemed such 
a long walk from the bridge into town, but it was just minutes in the car.  I crossed the 
ironworks bridge without incident, though I had expected to smash into an invisible 
barrier. 
When I topped a hill and passed a ramshackle frame building that bore a sign 
declaring it the ‘Town Store’, I whispered to myself, “Oh, shit.” 
Over the next rise, I passed the dark man standing in the opposite lane.  He waved 
mockingly, and I could tell from the tremble of his clothing that he was laughing blackly.  
‘Ha ha,’ I could guess him saying, ‘What a joke!’ 
Though I suspected there could easily be two such men on the planet, I very much 
doubted this.  Still, I drove on down the road…  until I came to a cross roads, and that 

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same familiar stop sign.  The way before lead through town, up the hill, to the end of all 
roads. 
“Son of a bitch,” I cursed, spinning the wheel about in the center of the 
intersection, and gunning the motor until the tires smoked and I was well on my way 
again.  “Must have turned around when I kicked that old bastard out,” I thought, trying 
not to remember that I had actually crossed the bridge afterward.  Maybe we had gone 
further than I originally thought, maybe we had passed the bridge while he was rambling, 
and I failed to notice it for the stench of the old fart.  That was it, I decided. 
I passed him again on the way out.  Waving and laughing, he continued to limp 
along the road’s shoulder, bound for the bridge.  The wind and dust of my passage 
assaulted him like countless unseen wraiths that would strip him of his clothing and wide, 
floppy hat.  He fought with clawed hands to keep it all together. 
I passed the town store again, thinking of Bonnie and her gaunt partner.  Then I 
crossed the bridge, and a few minutes later, the town store again.  Then the dark man, 
limping along and laughing and waving, as before. 
Seconds later, I was sitting at the crossroads in the center of town, facing the end 
of it all, once more.  Once more, I smoked the Datsun’s tires and fled. 
Once more, in sequence, I passed the laughing old man, the town store, crossed 
the bridge, then passed the town store, and the laughing old man.  This time, he collapsed 
to the grass alongside the highway, rolling with gales of hilarity.  Slapping his knees and 
gripping his guts, he choked on his own amusement. 

Johnny Bullet 

 

Stephen Huff 
116 
The Datsun’s tires smoked again, as I smashed the brake pedal flat and slid to a 
sideways stop across the center line.  I tossed open my door and leapt out onto the 
blacktop, seething. 
He choked and gasped and rolled and laughed.  He was saying, “Hot shit!  Never 
seen one make the trip so many times in such a hurry!  Ha ha, what a joke!  What a panic!  
Figured it out, did you.  Third time’s the charm, Johnny.  Why not go again, huh.  
Maybe this time around, you’ll get where you’re goin’!” 
I stalked across the lane and made a motion to kick him savagely in the ribs.   With the 
surprising speed of something that had seemed slow but moved with alacrity, he dodged my foot, 
and spun around to a ready stance. 
His hands cupped before him, fingers folding and unfolding, egging me on, he growled, 
“Come on, Johnny Boy, try me.  Try me.”  He moved with the slow, circling motion of a 
dangerous animal poised to pounce.  “Step up, superstar.  See what an old man can do!” 
Put off by his abrupt animation, I stood straighter, relaxing my stance.  “Okay,” I 
conceded soberly, unhappily.  “Maybe I need that education, now.” 
“Ha!” he gloated, “And you’ll be damned lucky to get it.  Now.” 
“Why.” I demanded in return, hating the petulant whine in my voice that was the 
disappointment of a frustrated child. 
“Might be too late now, is why.  They probably saw what you done.  Might not want you, 
no more.” 
“Bullshit.”  I took a slow turn of the forest.  We were alone, standing in the street. 

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117 
“Johnny, you’re gonna have to learn that this ain’t a standard sort of place, if you follow 
me.  It’s not Houston, Texas, that’s for damned sure, nor Austin, neither, much as we’d both like 
to be back there.  No, it’s a place altogether different than any place you’ve ever known.” 
“I thought that was the whole lesson.” 
He laughed, and flapped his arms so the stink of him wafted across my flared nostrils.  
“Not hardly, boy.  Not hardly.” 
“Then what.” 
He shrugged.  “Don’t know that I could tell you now.  Maybe you pissed me off, throwin’ 
me down like you done.  Maybe I don’t want to be your friend, no more.  Now, what do you 
think of that, superstar.” 
“I think I could figure it out without you.” 
Though shaded by the brim of his battered hat, I saw how his face waxed serious again.  
A deadly intensity replaced his fool’s demeanor.  “Sure you could, Johnny.” 
“Then why shouldn’t I.” 
“‘Cause then I wouldn’t get what I want from you, and that could be a very bad thing.” 
“I bet.”  Still, I thought I should hear what he had to say, in light of my most recent and 
bizarre travels.  “Okay, I won’t throw you down any more.  How is that.” 
His head was shaking before I finished speaking.  “Nope, not good enough.  It ain’t got 
nothing to do with me, Johnny.  Not just me, any way.  I mean, I got my part in this, I got that 
thing I want from you, but then there’s THEM.  Them that get what they want, or else.  I can’t go 
against ‘em, not even for you, Johnny Bullet.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 

Stephen Huff 
118 
“Who the hell are you talking about, old man.” 
Sauntering over to the Datsun, he leaned against it, the fool again.  “Well, we’ll see, 
won’t we.  We’ll see.” 
“When.  When will we see.”  I couldn’t stand the stench much longer, not for any price. 
“Soon.  Maybe tomorrow.  Or the next day.” 
“In the meantime.” 
He cackled, “You and me, Johnny, we’re to be best of friends!  Forever and ever, amen.” 
“Until death do us part, old man.” 
“Something like that, Johnny!  Something like that.  Now, I guess we ought to head back 
to town again, maybe find a bite to eat, you think.  You got money, don’t you, Johnny.  Lot’s of 
money, I bet.” 
“What’s that to you.  I’m not going to feed you, if that’s what you want.  I’m eating free 
over at the hotel.” 
“Free!” he shouted.  “Did you hear that, world!  The man says it’s FREE!  Well, ha ha, 
and hallelujah!  Jesus Christ, Johnny, you, of all people, should know that nothing’s free!  Not 
even the love of your own mama!”  He started around the Datsun to climb into its passenger seat.  
“Still, maybe you could rustle something up for an old friend like me, huh.  Something hot and 
covered with ketchup!” 
I grimaced.  The thought of watching him eat rolled my stomach bitterly.  “I don’t care 
where you go or what you do when we get back to town, you old bastard.  I’m not rooming with 

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119 
you, and I’m not eating with you.  I don’t give a shit if the whole fucking place goes up in 
flames.” 
“Alright, Johnny, alright.  I been fendin’ for myself all this time, I guess a few more days 
wouldn’t hurt.  Much.” 
A few more days.  “And another thing.  If you’re going to sit within ten feet of me, 
you’re going to have to bathe.  Two or three times maybe, right in a row.   With soap.  You stink 
like days old shit, man!” 
Cackling, he nodded, and slipped through the Datsun’s open door.  “Don’t I know it.  I 
can’t hardly smell myself no more, though. ‘Cept when the wind shifts!  Or I ride in a car with 
the windows rolled up, ha ha!” 
I shook my head, wondered why I had hooked up with this vagabond, and opened my 
own door.  Back inside the car’s cab, the ripe stench of him was overpowering.  I held my nose, 
and drove back to town. 
We stopped at that familiar intersection, and I asked him where he wanted to go.  His 
answer, as always, was, “Wherever you’re going, Johnny.” 
“I’ll take you over to the hotel.  Maybe they’ll let you hose off out back, or something.” 
“I don’t know, Johnny,” he hedged, waggling his head negatively.  “Them hoses run 
COLD, boy.  I’d be out amongst ‘em, where everybody could see.” 
“Could see what.” I scoffed, turning right and rolling back through town to our 
destination.  “A river of mud wash off you.” 

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120 
He laughed.  “Always the smartass, right.  I got my pride, you know, even though you 
don’t believe it.  Besides, my pecker shrinks up in the cold, and it wouldn’t do me justice, some 
nice lady seein’ it that way.” 
Despite myself, I grinned and shook my head.  “There aren’t any nice ladies in this town.  
Besides, they would vomit, either way, old man.” 
“Maybe,” he chuckled.  “Still, a man can’t advertise himself so.” 
“I think you’ll survive.  We’ll get a towel so you can hide your shame when you’re 
finished.  It’s either that, or good-bye.” 
“Okay, okay, Johnny.  No need to threaten, you know.  I guess I could use a shave, too, 
and maybe I could wash these old rags while I’m at it.” 
“Sounds good.  I’ll see if I can find some flea and tick shampoo for you,” I jibed.  
“You’re sure to be infested.” 
“Ha ha, boy, what fun,” he remarked with a deadpan tone.  “Johnny Boy,” he began 
again, his voice an exasperated sigh that was a parent chiding a child, “You’re gonna learn soon 
enough that smellin’ good is nothin’ in this place.  You try crossin’ ten days of wilderness hell 
on foot and come out smellin’ so fine.  You’re damned lucky I’m here, at all.” 
A sidelong glance in his direction told me he was serious.  “Funny, I don’t feel so lucky.” 

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Stephen Huff 
121 
His attention turned to the town, where it fled past his open window.  Wistfully, 
he supplied, “You could spend a thousand years here, Johnny.  Some do.  After a while, 
the seconds will seem an eternity, and the days will seem... forever.  Going nowhere.  
Doing nothing.  With nothing to hope for.  For a week, and the week be a year.  For a 
month, and the month be a decade.   For a year, and the year be a century.  Stay for ten 
years, Johnny, and you’ll never leave.  Never.” 
I couldn’t be certain if he was speaking figuratively or literally.  I decided, given 
my recent experiences here, it might be either.  Further, I decided I wouldn’t be staying 
for a month or even a year, let alone ten. 
“Now you’re sayin’ to yourself,” he belched, his voice dreamy, “You would never 
stay so long in this place.  You’re tellin’ yourself that you’ll be movin’ on any time now.”  
He tore his gaze away from the open window.  “But you won’t.  They all say the same 
things, and they all stay.  Just like you’ll stay.  Unless...” 
With a groan, I prompted, “Unless what.” 
“Unless you got somewhere else to go.” 
“Like where.”  He would say nothing more of it. 
I tired of prompting him, but my curiosity was piqued.  He had indeed been 
waiting for me at the barricades.  He knew me.  He had seemed well aware of what would 
become of crossing that bridge.  Though the source was unwholesome, I decided the old 
man had something to teach me.  Even if it was another lesson in the fallacy of trust. 
We arrived at the hotel.  I parked in the street. 
Francis sat, brooding, on the porch, gently rocking in a bench that hung from the 
rafters by chains.  He was immediately suspicious of the Datsun and its disheveled 

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Stephen Huff 
122 
passenger, but his expression changed when I climbed out to the street.  The old man 
remained sitting, reluctant to face those cold hoses, I thought. 
“It’s alright,” I leaned through my open door to encourage the foul old man.  
“That’s just Francis.” 
“Just Francis,” he mocked without taking his eyes off the little man on the swing.  
“Let me tell you somethin’ about that little fuck.  Don’t you ever play cards or tumble 
dice with him, you hear.  That’s one cheatin’ sumbitch.” 
I raised my head over the cab and gave this little man a smile.  Then returned to 
the old man, “Or maybe you’re just unlucky.” 
His deadly expression returned, he faced me, raising the brim of his battered hat 
enough to direct his burning eyes on mine.  “It takes a cheater to know a cheater, Johnny, 
so all I’m sayin’ is that’s the cheating-est sumbitch I ever had the misfortune to meet at a 
table.” 
“Oh, I see.  Thanks for the advice.” 
He grunted to acknowledge, “Ain’t nothin’ free, Johnny Boy, remember that 
come time to take care of the business between us.” 
Without making a reply, I slammed my door shut, and started up the steps to the 
porch.  Francis returned my earlier smile warmly, and seemed inclined to exchange 
words.  Since the old man was slow at the curb and steps, I sidled closer and raised my 
chin to say hello. 
“Who’s your friend.” he asked at once.  I was instantly aware that, while the old 
man recognized Francis, Francis did not reciprocate the acquaintance.   He had known the 
old fart in a different guise, then, I guessed. 

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Stephen Huff 
123 
“A bum I picked up.  I’m going to hose him down out back.” 
Francis grinned and rocked without facing me.  “Yeah, she’ll love that, I bet.  He 
looks like ten miles of ungraded dirt road.” 
“And he stinks like a dumpster.” 
“Then why drag him up here.” he demanded sharply, puzzled beyond reason. 
“I thought I’d clean him up a bit, since we seem to have business.”  I leaned 
against the rail, and noticed how the old man had stopped on the first stair, the slant of his 
hat clearly indicating his regard of the impeccable Francis. 
“Oh.  What sort of business could you possibly have with the likes of that trash.” 
his voice betrayed his disappointed in me.  I had apparently dropped a point or two on his 
scheme of human classification. 
“I have no idea.   He says he knows me, that he wants something from me, and 
has something I need.” 
“One of those,” groaned the other.  “Watch out for that kind, friend.  They’re 
parasites.” 
To the old man, I shouted, “Go on around back!  I’ll go through the hotel and pick 
up a towel!”  He nodded, and, after some consideration of the proper way, proceeded 
around the corner of the building and out of sight. 
“He seems harmless enough.” 
“Suit yourself.”  He returned his gaze to the forest canopy, where it stood above 
the buildings across the street. 

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Stephen Huff 
124 
“Thanks, I think I will,” I returned placidly, pulling the front door open.  
Casually, by way of making conversation, I tossed over my shoulder, “So, you done for 
the day.” 
His glance at me was concerned and sharp.  He made no reply, but I had the 
distinct impression that he was worried for my sanity.  Or perhaps terribly afraid of me. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
125 

 

J 
 
Johnny Bullet 

I don’t know why, but I waited in the courtyard behind the hotel while the old 
man performed his ablutions.  The lady of the house came to the window more than once 
to stare at me blackly, but she didn’t ask us to stop.  Not even when he hung his foul, 
dripping things to dry from the limbs of the dreary trees that ringed the patio. 
We sat on opposite sides of an unsteady outdoor table, which was covered with 
dead leaves and little splotches of bird shit, him wearing a towel, his fat, white body piled 
grotesquely roll upon roll, me trying to find something, anything, interesting in the forest 
canopy or the unkempt courtyard.  He had shaved with an old razor, so his cheeks and 
jowls were spotted with oozing blemishes.  Having tied his long, shaggy hair in a knot 
behind his head, he yet wore the floppy hat, which struck a comical contrast to the white 
towel tied around his gut. 
Picking at his freshly bleeding wounds and sitting with his legs crossed in a 
disgusting fashion, he said, “You know what I think.” 
I shook my head, no.  I knew what I was thinking, however.  I was thinking of my 
dark, brooding hostess, where she was even then glaring at me from her kitchen window.  

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126 
I was thinking of what she had said about knots in time, and how this place had a way of 
weaving people together strangely. 
“I think,” he continued eventually, unaware of my vague disinterest, “That I died 
in Viet Nam during a previous life.  In the war there, you know.  I’ve always had this 
feeling that I’ve been there, when I haven’t.  When I see them shows on TV about it, I 
recognize the sensation of it, personally. Like I was watchin’ my own home movies, or 
somethin’.  What’s more,” he added authoritatively, “I was born sometime around the Tet 
Offensive.  You remember that.  1968.  So it sort of figures. 
“I thought about it a long, long time as a young man.  I thought about it and had 
dreams about it and wondered about it until I couldn’t stand it, no more.  So you know 
what I done.  Back when I was workin’ at the university, before you came along, Johnny, 
and before all that trouble, I went down to the history department’s library.  I looked it all 
up, that’s what I done.  December 17, 1968, Johnny, that’s the blessed day.  So I figured, 
well, that must have been the day I died in that previous life, you know.  Then, as I was 
lookin’ it up, I realized it might not be the day of my birth that I died, Johnny, but the day 
of my conception.”  He tossed his arms up habitually, showing his frustration and 
dropping the towel in the same instant.  As he leisurely moved to recover himself, he 
rambled on, “And God knows when that was!  I mean, who can say what day they was 
CONCEIVED, Johnny.  That’s the trick of it, I decided, that’s how life fools you so you 
can’t know yourself from before.  So you have to start it all over again from the 
beginning, without the benefit of what you learned the last time around. 
“That pissed me off just a little bit, I guess, ‘cause I went to my own dear mother, who 
was still alive at the time, and I asked her when I was conceived.  Do you know, Johnny, that she 

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127 
had an answer.  I was amazed, but it was because she... well, she didn’t get around much, I 
guess, her bein’ a sort of homely woman.  So it was on St. Patrick’s day of 1968, she told me, 
some time around ten o’clock in the evening.  Can you imagine that, Johnny.  How many guys 
can say they know the exact day, the exact HOUR that they came into being. 
“Well, I went right back to that library the next day, Johnny, and I looked it up.  I wrote 
down the names of each and every man that died on St. Patrick’s day, 1968 at ten o’clock PM 
Viet Nam time.  Do you know what, Johnny.”  He beamed, and wouldn’t continue unless I 
prompted him. 
Which I did with a flat, “What.” 
“There was one.  Just one.  Now, what do you think of that.” 
I shrugged.  “Coincidence.  Reincarnation is bullshit.” 
“Yeah, Johnny.  Sure about that, are you.  Dead sure.” and he cackled madly, slapping 
his knee so the towel was quit of him again.  Scooping it back into place once more, he sputtered, 
“Know all about it, do you.  Johnny Bullet,” he mocked, raising his voice as an announcer, 
“Superstar and after-fuckin’-life EXPERT.  That right, Johnny.  No.  Then just what the hell do 
you think happens to a man after he dies, huh.” 
“Nothing.  Lights out.  Good night.” 
“Nothing.  You can’t believe that, Johnny.” 
“When a chicken or a cow or a cockroach dies, nobody makes much of it, old man.  You 
ever see anybody saying benediction over their rare steak at dinnertime.  Why should it be any 
different for us.” 

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128 
“Johnny!” he gasped, scolding me, shaking his head so the hat flopped this way and that.  
“What you said!  Cows and chickens and cockroaches, Johnny.  I ain’t no cow, nor none of that 
other, neither!  I’m a man, a reasonin’ man with a soul.” 
“A soul.” I scoffed, despite myself.  I didn’t want to encourage him, but it was a lazy sort 
of morning, the sun climbing unseen to its zenith and the forest oddly quiet.  It was an hour for 
napping or fishing or waxing philosophical about nothing that much mattered. 
“Yeah, a soul.  If that’s what you want to call it, I mean,” he added, sitting back to relax a 
bit after I had so obviously disturbed him.  “You may think me a dumb hick, Johnny.  I guess, in 
most ways, I am, but I spent five hard years in prison, mister, and not a lot to do besides read.  
Then there was my work at the university.  Sure, I was there to mop the floors, not walk ‘em, not 
like you and your kind, Johnny.  Sure, I didn’t leave there with a nice embossed piece of paper 
licensin’ me to run the gover’ment, or nothin’, but I was there, Johnny.  You can’t say I wasn’t, 
‘cause I was.  Sometimes, Johnny, though you don’t believe it, even before the can, I went down 
to them libraries to read me some of the world.  You bet. 
“I learned some stuff, too, and not the kinda learnin’ that’s handed down on a tuition, 
neither.  It was the kind of learnin’ that comes from a man’s sweat and crossed brow.  It was the 
kinda learnin’ that, once learned, a man can’t possibly forget.  Like... zippin’ your dick, Johnny!  
Ever do THAT more than once.”  Again, despite myself, I grinned and shook my head.  
“Damned straight.  I rarely met a man that has, and the ones I’ve met that make THAT mistake 
more than once are dumber’n dirt, boy. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
129 
“So I learned me a thing or two in my time on this planet, Johnny.  I learned about souls.  
And karma.  And the Dao.   Now, what do you think about that.” 
“Daoism.” I parried, raising my eyebrows to show I was impressed.  “What did you 
learn, then, old man.  Enlighten me.” 
He grunted.  “I learned it’s a long walk and a long way, Johnny.  I learned how life is 
nothin’ about what’s right and what’s wrong.  It’s about time, Johnny.  That’s all.  Just time.” 
“Time.  How so.” 
“‘Cause, Johnny, time ain’t no line, so to speak.  It ain’t a goin’-to-comin’-from sort of 
thing.  It ain’t a destination, it don’t have a beginin’.  When most people think about time, 
Johnny, they think of it like a string.  Startin’ here, stretchin’ along this way, maybe wrapped 
around a bit and goin’ back and forth for a while, then endin’ just there.  Only, that ain’t the way 
it is, Johnny.  Time ain’t no string, it’s round, like a ball.  It’s everything that could ever be all 
the time everywhere, and there ain’t no beginin’ and there ain’t no end, just like there ain’t no 
beginin’ or end to a ball.  You see.” 
I shook my head.  “It’s as obvious as you are, old man.” 
“Let’s start simple, Johnny Boy, ‘cause you ain’t got five years in hell to figure it out, 
like I had.  Now, take this mornin’ for instance.  You and me met at the barricades, right.  You 
stopped and gave me a ride.  Now, there is another time and another place, though it’s the same 
time and the same place, where you didn’t give me a ride, and still another where we never met 
at all, and still another where you never even came to town, and like that.  Not like, separate, 
Johnny, not different.  The same.  All in the same place in the same instant. 

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130 
“Now look to your own beginning.  At some point in some place, your mama squirted 
you out.  Sometime later, somewhere, somehow, your clock is gonna stop.  So it seems like a 
straight line, startin’ with birth and endin’ with death, and just these very few things that 
happened in between, all in a particular order.  You wake up.  You get outta bed.  You dress.  
You open the door.  Just like that, it seems, but, Johnny, startin’ with the moment you were 
conceived, everything that COULD happen to you HAS happened to you.  Everything that you 
might have done, has been done. 
“You ever have a close brush with death, Johnny.  Like an accident where you almost 
died.” 
“A friend was playing with a gun when I was a kid.  We thought it was unloaded, but it 
went off.  The bullet hit the wall less than a foot from my head.  Like that.” 
“Exactly like that.  Let me tell you, Johnny, you died that day.  As surely as you walked 
away.  As surely as it never happened, at all.  Do you see. 
“It’s bigger than that, even, way, way bigger.  So big you can’t hardly even think about it.  
‘Cause we’re just the smallest part of it all, Johnny, you and me.  Time is large, Johnny, huge, 
vast, bigger than the biggest thing you can think of times ten, ha ha!   It has to be, ‘cause it holds 
everything else, and not just for the now, but FOREVER, Johnny.  If you consider that time is 
not a progression from here to there, if you consider that time is a thing like you and me that 
always was as it is, then you gotta see how it’s... bogglin’.” 
“Yeah,” I agreed, wondering if I should reprise my opinion of him, whether for better or 
worse.  “Boggling is the word for it.” 

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131 
“So, see, there’s a place in time where this whole universe never was, Johnny!  This 
whole UNIVERSE!  And time holds that place just like it holds this one, where the universe IS!  
A whole universe IS in time.  All them stars.  All them planets.  All of us.  Every minute of us, 
and our parents and THEIR parents.  And the pharoahs, Johnny, all the same.” 
Unable to decide if he was rambling madly or actually making sense, I decided to deny 
him the benefit of the doubt.  “Sounds like a schizophrenic’s explanation of the world.” 
“Not just of the world, Johnny, but of everything.”  Finished with the scabs forming at his 
chin and chops, he turned his gaze with mine on the canopy, where it was exposed beyond the 
roofs of the buildings across the way.  “I can’t figure it any further than that, and I only get a 
fuzzy picture of it, really.  This one guy in the joint, though, he could sure lay it all out, right 
down to the dot and line.  He even had numbers, big, scary numbers, to back it all up.  I believed 
him, ‘cause he was one smart convict.  The smartest.  The kind that could make a man shit his 
pants to hear the things he had thought up, ‘cause he was a very bad man, too, given to a love of 
all kinds of badness.  The worst sort of badness. 
“Still,” he sighed, thumbing his towel to keep it tight around his bulging waist.  “It’s not 
an easy thing to see.  It takes time, I know, but it’s the truth.  It HAS to be the truth, ‘cause it’s 
simple and it makes sense.” 
“Simple.” 
“Well, the idea of it is simple, if the details are all scrambled up.” 
“That sounds like the very definition of bullshit to me.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
132 
He grinned, I could just see the half moon of his teeth beneath the shade of his hat.  
“Yeah, I guess, but I was just sayin’, is all, Johnny, how it’s a funny sort of thing, me and you 
bein’ here like we are.  It’s a funny sort of thing, ‘cause we might have been a million different 
places in a million different times, yet here we are.  In this place.  At this time.  Together.” 
“You make it sound like we’re married.” 
“Not married, Johnny.  Woven.  We’ve been woven together.  By fate, if that’s what you 
call the strange twists that time’s course takes.” 
She was at the window again, I noticed, watching blackly with her black eyes.  Her 
expression a mask of neutrality, I decided she was listening to us.  I imagined that I was sizzling 
happily in the blaze of her burning regard. 
“But you can see, at least,” he continued, apparently oblivious to the dropping curtain 
that fluttered erratically where someone had just been standing, “Why you shouldn’t be so quick 
to say what happens after, Johnny.  It’s like that guy in Viet Nam dying in the same hour that I 
was conceived, and how I felt I had been there.  Maybe it’s really true, Johnny.  Maybe we never 
really die, you see, maybe a part of us, the most important part of us, is timeless.” 
“What difference does it make either way.” I queried, wondering more than ever if he 
was a lunatic or a prophet.  I could not forget my strange journeys across the bridge.  I could not 
forget the stench of that silent forest. 
“It means lots of different things to different people, I guess.  For us bad men, Johnny, 
the best of it has two parts.  Part one; you exist somewhere else as a good man that has never 
sinned in his life.  Part two; you aren’t responsible for the delivery of your destiny in this life.  

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
133 
You were meant to do the things you did.  You HAD to do the things you did, or you wouldn’t 
be you at this moment in this place, Johnny.  Do you see.” 
Instantly, I liked it.  It was just the sort of philosophy a convict genius might devise.  It 
condoned everything and sanctioned nothing.  It made victims of all predators, and predators of 
all victims. 
“Ah,” he gloated, “I struck a note, didn’t I, Johnny Boy!  Ha ha, the old man’s good for 
something, after all.  Bet that’ll help you sleep.  For a while.” 
“I don’t have any trouble sleeping, old man.” 
“Sure, Johnny, sure.  Neither do I.  I never heard such snorin’ as I heard in the joint at 
night, and all them bad men havin’ done murders and rapes and abductions and robberies.  All 
them heavy consciences, Johnny, and dreamin’ like little babies.” 
Bored again, I stood to check his clothing with a tentative touch.  I didn’t want to get too 
close, after all.  “I wouldn’t know anything about it,” I offered cavalierly. 
“Ha ha, but you may!  You may yet, Johnny Bullet!  How’s THAT gonna be, I wonder.  
Hmm.  Half a dozen buck niggers on a superstar like you.  Might take a full dozen for a guy as 
big as you, but, you know what, Johnny.  No matter how many it takes, they’ll get to you.  They 
always do.  It’s initiation, you see.  Like all them keggers you pulled at the frats, right.  Ha ha, 
what fun!” 
“You’re a real fucking nut, you know that.  When are we going to get to what you want 
from me.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
134 
He waggled his finger and his head at the same time.  “Now, now, Johnny.  Don’t 
be in a rush.  You may not know it, yet, but you have all the time in the world.” 
“I’m told you’re a parasite,” I fired broadside, if only to focus the subject.  
“Maybe I’ll get tired of wondering what you want from me sooner than you think.” 
“A parasite.” he returned, wounded.  “Who told you that.  I bet it was that rat on 
the porch, wasn’t it, Johnny!  Ha!  Now there’s a parasite to call a parasite a parasite!  
Him.  What the hell does HE know.  He’s been here for years, Johnny, YEARS.  He’ll 
never get out.  Never.” 
“Why not.” 
“Don’t know.  Don’t care.  Could be, he likes it here.” 
I looked to the window, but it was empty.  “I doubt it.  He misses breakfast 
frequently.” 
The old man laughed raucously.  “Some things never change, Johnny Boy!  It’s 
like clockwork, I think, this little part up and around over there to catch on that, then send 
another little part round and round until it’s wound up the first and she’s all ready to run 
‘round again!” he all but sang this last bit.  “To hell with him and his kind.  To hell with 
that foul woman at the window.  Yeesss,” he drawled triumphantly, “I seen her.  I seen 
her starin’ at my member when I was cold and it was all shriveled up, too!  Now didn’t I 
tell you a man can’t go around advertisin’ himself so.” 
He leaned close and was my co-conspirator.  In a near whisper, he offered, “She’s 
of the kind, you know.  Of the kind that stays.   That takes a life for themselves here.”  He 
shivered.  “Blech, but that kind worries me.  You wanna know why.” 
“Why.” I humored him. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
135 
“‘Cause I know they can’t stay forever, Johnny.  Which means that sometime 
they’re gonna wander on, back to the world maybe.  Maybe even hatch out again!  What 
do you think they’ll turn out to be, after ten thousand centuries in this place, Johnny.  
Hmm.”  He sat back, and leaned over to one side, pontificating his sermon with a fart.  
“Adolph Hitler, I bet.  Genghis Khan.  Like that!  Bad men, very bad men.” 
“I really don’t know what you’re talking about, mister.”  I sat back to study him 
harshly.  “I remember you from the campus, though.  Always skulking about in the 
shadows.  Furtive.  That’s the word I think of when I think of you back then.  Like you 
were always trying to peak under the door to catch us naked.  I saw you once, you know, 
looking through that hole you had drilled in the wall between the gymnasium and the 
girl’s shower.” 
Rather than being shamed, his grin broadened.  “HA!  What were you doin’ there, 
Johnny Boy.  Nobody could know about that hole, but that they had been back there 
lookin’ to drill one of their own!” 
I felt myself blush uncontrollably.  “I’m not saying it was a bad thing, old man.  
After we found out about it, a lot of my brothers visited it from time to time.”  I laughed, 
suddenly remembering forgotten pranks.  “Sometimes with their cameras!  All I’m saying 
is, I remember you, the way you were.” 
“And.” 
“You creeped me out then.  You creep me out now.  Especially now.” 
He sighed, hurt.  “I thought I was gettin’ through to you, Johnny Boy.  I had such 
high hopes!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
136 
“For what.” I demanded sharply, frustrated.  “What the hell do you want from 
me.” 
“Nothing more than the lady at the window wants.  Nothing more than the little 
girl in the pigtails wants.  Nothing more than the Map Man wants, Johnny.” 
“That being.” 
“Out.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
137 

 

K 

Kansas 

Once, I sat with my father, my step-father, I mean, on a long dyke that lined the 
Salina River in Salina, Kansas.  We were, as always, fishing or hunting or something of 
the kind.  I can’t remember ever catching anything that day, and I think we were there 
more because he wanted to get me alone in the woods than for the fishing, or whatever. 
Afterward, we lay on the hood of his truck as the sun set, our backs propped on 
the windshield, our hands locked behind our heads, and we watched the stars spin lazily 
into being with nightfall.  Insects and frogs sang us a chorus from the trees that lined the 
river’s banks. 
An occasional meteorite streaked the heavens, hell bent in a hurry to nowhere.  
Come and gone in a flash. 
While the sun painted the western skies with colors so awfully beautiful that I felt 
tears well to my eyes to watch it slide out of sight.  It coveted the world with a display 
that could never be ignored, a dying reach for the earth that must come in the colors of 
blood and of deep purple bruises.  These were all, strangely, colors to sooth my burning 
soul at the moment. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
138 
If I were God, I thought then, if I had the right sort of paints and a proper brush, I 
felt I would paint the same scene across the world.  It was a blazing madness of emotion, 
that sky.  Its scrambled beauty and inevitable tragedy were a replica of my own internal 
struggles.  It was hypnotic, and deadly. 
Because the night must come.  For every day that shines, a darkness must follow 
it round and snuff it out. 
I realized then how all things having begun must end.  Life was borrowed, I 
suddenly knew.  We were, all of us, even him that lay beside me, temporary and slight.  
One day, later I hoped than sooner, even I must lay in a small box buried in the dirt, in 
the darkness, my arms crossed over my breast, my eyes stapled shut, my guts filled with 
chemicals... forever, until the end of time. 
The deciding factor of it all was time.  Simple time.  An ephemeral, intangible 
abstraction without explanation, it was the tumble of sand grains through an hour glass, it 
was the rough, crude workings of countless wound mechanisms that would measure 
vainly.  It was a thousand centuries in a second, time, or an hour in a heartbeat. 
It was the sun’s slow slide that night, burning down the world so the horizon 
raged with it.  So the heavens bled for it and bathed us in its crimson rush. 
He breathed deeply and evenly beside me, and I believed him to be asleep, but it 
seemed he was filtering my thoughts, when he grunted and said, “It’s moments like these, 
John, that make me think of all the cages in the world.” 
“Cages.” I asked innocently.  He was drunk.  I knew he was drunk, but the 
strangeness of his remark caught me by surprise, and I encouraged him before I thought. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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139 
“Cages.  Lots of little cages.  A clock is a cage, John.  You believe that, if you believe 
nothing else I say.  Maybe the worst cage of them all.  Because it’s the cage that keeps us all, 
every one.  From the greatest to the smallest, the richest to the poorest.  We all dance to the tune 
of the second hand, and crawl beneath the shadow of the hour hand. 
“We give thanks at the New Year for having survived another.  We toast ourselves, all 
sharing the same thought.  All figuring a single cipher.  How many more.  How many more, 
John.  Hmm.”  I don’t know where he found it, and it must have been hours hot by then, but he 
lifted a can of beer to his lips, and he struggled, gulping, to drain it.  The fluid ran down his chin 
and across his cheeks so it sparkled in the starlight, countless rivers to run the obstacle course of 
his whiskers.  “How many more are allowed me.  Hmm. 
“Ten.  Twenty.  Thirty.  I don’t know,” he drawled, slurring the hard consonants.  “But I 
bet it ain’t a hundred!  Of that I’m sure!  Ten, though, maybe twenty.  I could do twenty.” 
I cringed.  Surely, I thought, not even the devil could be so cruel as to prosper that man 
on this planet for so long. 
“Ten for sure, though.”  I prayed to a God I didn’t know.  “But it’s the same cage, 
whether it’s ten or twenty.  I say... IT’S NOT E-FUCKING-NOUGH!”  He drained the beer this 
time, and tossed the empty can over the cab and into the bed with an alcoholic’s expert arm.  
“And when I get to heaven,” I was thinking ‘hell’, “And meet that fucking guy, God, I’m going 
to kick his ever loving ASS!  Fucking joker!  What kind of shit is it, John.  To give a man a 
certain number of years, a certain number of night skies like this, a certain number of heartbeats, 
a certain number of breaths, but no more! 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
140 
“You see how it’s a cage.  It’s a way in and a way out, but only at the beginning and at 
the end.  Everything in between is a sort of prison.  Because we can’t get out of who we are, 
John, we can’t undo WHAT we are.  Some of it’s laid out for us from birth, like how your own 
daddy left you the way he did when you were just a pup,” I felt my hands grip hotly, and I 
thought of his throat that bristled with whiskers and was slick with a stale brew.  “But most of it, 
John, is our own doing.  I take this step, you see, but not the other.  I walk this way, but not that 
way. 
“Still, it’s like that sunset, I think.  It’s wired tight to its cycles, and so are we.  God made 
it that way, I guess, or the devil and God can’t break it.  The Earth rolls and the sun rises to set.  
Day after day after day.  When a man reaches a certain age, John, all he can think of is the count 
of his number.  How many days.  How many gone.  How many left. 
“Then he starts to wish he could reach up and grab that fucking sun and stop it turning for 
good.  God damned days gone by, and for what.  A paycheck at the end of the week that’s never 
enough to compensate a man for all those hours of his life wished away. 
“Do you know, I work a job I hate.  I work for a man I would love to murder.  I do stuff 
that wouldn’t add up to a cold turd on a sidewalk, even if you scraped up every minute, every 
ounce of it and put it all in one place!  For pennies.”  He spat over the hood and settled himself 
atop the windshield wiper that gouged his back.  “To keep your mother in pantyhose and 
smokes...  to keep you in sneakers.  Then there’s me standing at the counter or sitting behind a 
wheel, counting the seconds, sixty at a time, to add a minute.  Counting all those minutes, sixty 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
141 
at a time, to add an hour.  Counting the hours until five o’clock like a spendthrift whore counting 
her dollars.” 
He paused to make a savage motion of counting out dollars and tossing them to the wind.  
“One!  Two!  Three!  A thousand!  Ten thousand!  Ten thousand hours, John, can you think of 
that.  How many days is that.”  When I didn’t immediately answer, thinking his query 
rhetorical, he jabbed me in the ribs with an elbow.  “Huh, schoolboy.  How many days is ten 
thousand hours.” 
I crunched the numbers in my head and on my fingers.  “About four hundred.” 
“Four hundred.” he demanded, insulted and confused. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
142 
“Twenty four is like twenty five.  Twenty five into ten thousand goes about four 
hundred times.” 
“Twenty four what.” 
“Twenty four hours in a day.” 
“No, no, no, boy, when the hell did you ever see an honest man work twenty four 
hours in a day.”  He laughed.  “Hot damn, it’s bad, but it ain’t THAT bad!  No, I mean, 
in eight hour shifts, how many days.  How many days, at eight hours a day.” 
I thought a moment.  “Twelve hundred and fifty.  Exactly.” 
“Twelve hundred and fifty,” he repeated, shaking his head sadly.  “You shouldn’t 
have told me that, boy.  How many years is it.” 
“About three and a half.” 
“Three and a half years.  That’s all.  You sure.”  I nodded to show I was.  “Shit.  
That ain’t so much.  So, let’s see, at three and a half years per ten thousand hours, that’s, 
ah, uh, help me out here, John, that’s, uh, how many hours in a lifetime.” 
“I don’t understand.” 
“In a lifetime of shifts.  Say a man works fifty weeks a year, five shifts a week, 
from the age of eighteen to sixty five.  How many days is that, Mr. Calculator.” 
“Eleven thousand and something.  Something like that.” 
“Eleven thousand shifts.  See what I mean.  Pulling eleven thousand shifts doing 
what I do for a living, now THAT’s a fucking prison, or I never heard of a man being 
punished!  For what, John.  Why.  To keep the farm.  What’s that scrap of dirt ever 
brought me but sweat and pain.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
143 
I didn’t know, so I said nothing.  I was thinking how good it would be to one day 
leave Iowa and never have to come on another of his ‘camping’ trips again.  I was 
especially thinking how good it would be to never, ever have to return to Kansas for any 
reason.  The only thing good about this place, I thought, was the sunsets, and they only 
last a few, brief minutes. 
“Nothing, that’s what,” he finished for himself, patting the breast pocket of his 
shirt for his cigarettes.  Producing a crumpled pack, he fished out the last butt and put a 
lighter to its end, sucking deeply of its poisons.  Suck deeper, I thought.  “My daddy and 
his daddy and his daddy before that.  Unlike you, John, I remember them all.  Yeah, even 
my daddy’s daddy’s daddy.”  He laughed. 
“I hadn’t thought of that shriveled up old geezer in years!  God, he must have 
been ninety when I knew him as a kid.  How do you figure he lasted so long, John.  Do 
you think he was better off for it, or worse.”  I shrugged again.  I didn’t know.  “What 
the hell do you know about it, any way.” he demanded drunkenly.  “You’re just a 
fucking punk kid.  You don’t know shit about pulling eight hours on the third shift, only 
to come home and drive a tractor over the rows for another eight hours, until your bones 
rattle and your thoughts come with the rumble of the pistons.  Until you can’t think but to 
think of a hot shower, a cold meal and a colder bed. 
“When you get home to claim it, when all is said and supposedly finished, what 
do you have.  Do you get what you want, even then.  You do not.  What you get, John, 
and you’re dick’ll fix you up for it, too, trust me... what you get is a fat, whining wife and 
a snot nosed kid that ain’t yours.  That’s what you get.  You get to raise another man’s 
son.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
144 
Suddenly, without warning, with a sharp elbow and a harsh shove, he pushed me 
off the hood of the truck.   Caught completely by surprise, as I always was by his 
unpredictable fits of violence, I went flying through the half light, over the edge of the 
dyke, some thirty feet into the grass and weeds and briars couched around its base.  
Entangled, I struggled to be free, because I knew he wasn’t finished.  I knew he had only 
just begun. 
As I worked my way out of the brambles, he came to the edge of the dyke and 
stood in silhouette over me, framed by a blood red sky that painted his shoulders and the 
top of his head with a demonic glow.  He stood there and he sucked on his cigarette, and 
he watched me tear myself frantically in the brush to find a clear spot for flight.  I saw 
him smile.  I remember clearly how the rising moon sparkled in little circles from each 
dripping tooth. 
With the slow motion jerk of a stop action camera, he sidled along the top of the 
embankment, puffing his poisonous air, chuckling sadistically.  Until he found a way 
down to me.  With a pall of dust that rose from his cloven feet, he tossed himself down 
the grade at me headlong. 
I had found my feet by then, and I wasn’t running.  I stood, hands at the ready, 
though not clenched into fists.  My fingers were straight and rigid.  As he came drunkenly 
on, I poked his eyes directly with my left, then immediately jabbed him in the throat with 
the other. 
I was big for ten years of age, and I didn’t like to be hurt.  I didn’t like to watch 
my mother being hurt, no matter how she felt about it.  I was smart.  I had learned that a 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
145 
man can learn anything from a book.  Anything.  Especially, he could learn how to kill 
another man. 
He fell face first into the weeds, screeching madly.  I spun around to face him, in 
a ready posture that I had practiced from diagrams, even as I would someday learn to 
score touchdowns from a play book.  Furious, with his hands at his eyes, he blinked to 
clear his vision, cursing.  Rising, he came on again. 
The flat of my right palm came up hard against the point of his nose.  I stepped 
back and to one side, clear of his angry swing. 
Once more, he sprawled into the weeds, cursing, blood gushing from his nose.  
Drunken, but sobering quickly, he gathered his wits a moment, and adjusted his 
understanding of the situation.  I watched the shadows of his face contort, as I changed 
from a frightened boy into an angry man within his gaze. 
I refused to be afraid.  I sucked deep breaths, and I willed my mind to stillness.  
Anticipating his next assault, which would be to stand and face me like a man, fist to fist, 
I waited for the moment, I encouraged him to stand and say it.  He scrambled from the 
brush, wiping blood from his lips with the back of his hand to show how little it mattered. 
“You little son of a bitch,” he growled, coming on again.  “You want it like a 
man, huh.  Like a man.  You fucking PUNK!”  He stood before me, angry and crouched 
to rip my head off, rolling his fists to show how deadly they were.  I lured him closer.  
“You little shit!  I’m going to teach you- OOF!” 
Punctuated by his own anguish, his face bulging and red, his eyes pinched shut to 
show his exquisite agony, he fell backward and into the dirt, clutching himself obscenely 
and crying like a small boy.  I stood over him, my fingers jutting and stiff. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
146 
With a carefully controlled voice, I said, “If you ever touch me or my mother 
again, I’m going to do this again.  I’m going to hurt you.  I’m going to hurt you real, real 
bad.” 
He could say nothing.  He clutched himself and he rolled in the dirt and the 
weeds, and he cried.  When I made a motion to kick him in the testicles again, he cringed 
away, and begged me not to hurt him. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
147 

 

L 

Liquid Fire 

“Funny thing about killin’,” he said some time later, as he dressed in his sun-
stiffened clothing.  “There’s a certain sort of redemption to be found in the worst of it.” 
“The worst of it.” 
“Yeah, you know, when it’s heinous.  Heinous or bloody or weird.  Or all three at 
once, ha ha!”  He paused buttoning his faded, stained, tattered black shirt to gaze directly 
into my eyes, his own eyes burning savagely.  “Like what you done, Johnny.  You’ll live 
forever because of it.  They’ll be stoppin’ by your grave to chip bits off your headstone 
for a hundred years, maybe longer, and when someone wants to say something nasty, 
they’ll say your name, Johnny. 
“You’ll be the shadow in countless closets at night, to frighten small children to 
sleep or keep them awake.  You’ll be stalking footsteps in the hallways for a generation 
of men and women.  You’ll be their nagging doubts, their plaguing fears.  You’ll be their 
suspicion, Johnny, you’ll be the thing they come to expect most from the end of it all.  
You’ll be a ghoul to haunt their every waking moment, to prey within their most lurid 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
148 
and disturbing dreams.  Why.”  I hadn’t asked, but he continued nonetheless, buttoning 
himself to cover his disgusting nakedness, at last.  “Because, Johnny.  Because. 
“If it could be you, then it could be ANYbody.  Anybody, Johnny, even they, 
themselves.  ‘Cause they all want to do it, you know, secretly, at night, when they think 
they’re alone and unwatched by God.  When they think their unspeakable longings pass 
muttered and unheard.  Ha ha, but nothing ever goes unheard, and we are never alone.  
We are never beyond witness, Johnny, ‘cause it’s all been done.  It’s all been said.  It’s all 
been seen. 
“They always know, in the end, before it’s finished.  They always find out.  Not 
that you could have it any other way, but a man would like to believe there’s hope, 
wouldn’t he, Johnny.  Every crime is the perfect crime, ha ha, when it starts out!  I’ll 
never get caught!  They’ll never know!  But they always know, I think.  Whether it 
comes out in court or in whispers, it comes out, the truth. 
“The fuckin’ truth, Johnny!  God damn it to hell!  What is it, anyway, but the easy 
way out.   Any man can tell the truth, I say.  It takes imagination to lie.  To lie well.  To 
be believed. 
“Only, a lie is like a scab, Johnny.  It comes up, after a while, to expose the very 
thing it was meant to protect and conceal.  It dries up and flakes away in time, unlike the 
truth, eternal as it is.  The truth is like gold, never to rust. 
“But a lie... well, it stands naked after a time, doesn’t it.  No matter what the liar 
would do to keep it.  The bigger the lie, the more obvious it becomes, and the quicker.  
You couldn’t get away from it, Johnny, even if you was to walk out of court a free man.  
It’s the whispers that would have convicted you.  Those damned whispers.  Everywhere 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
149 
you go.  They come with the pointing fingers and the ogling stares.  They come from 
behind the cupped palms and from around fanned programs, don’t they, Johnny.  
Fucking whispers!” 
I bristled.  “What the hell do you know about it, you crazy old bastard.” 
“Oh, la-de-da, Johnny Bullet, high society.  Nobody knows nothin’ but you, right.  That 
right, Mr. Smartass.  I figured a smart guy like you would have learned by now, especially after 
your short stay out of town, ha ha!”  He cackled himself into his pants, then into his shoes. 
It went on an eternity, I felt.  Just when I was ready to throttle him, the old fart reined in 
his mirth, sucked a double lungful of stinking air, and calmed himself.  “Shit, Johnny-Boy, you 
are one FUNNY motherfucker.” 
“I wasn’t trying to be funny,” I returned, my tone flat and as deadly as I could make it. 
This only seemed to tickle him further, as he sputtered and coughed himself into another 
fit of rough, jerking hilarity.  “I know!  I know!” he choked, “That’s what makes it so fuckin’ 
funny!” 
“I don’t like it, you laughing,” I growled by way of warning.  I felt my fingers stiffen 
straight out by my side, and I was thinking of his throat. 
He was suddenly, abruptly, disturbingly, serious.  From beneath the brim of his floppy 
hat, his eyes waxed fixed and menacing.  “You don’t like it, you say.  You don’t like it.  Well, 
come on and shut me up, PUNK!”  His fingers flexed open and shut, and he crouched to circle 
me. 
I was reminded of something, something dark that swam through the depths of my 
dreams as an undefined shadow.  Undefined, I say, though the shape of it was clear from its 
movements, which came swift and sure and intent.  I didn’t know what it was, but I knew it was 

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150 
deadly and earnest.  It was the dim form of a shark cruising far below.  It waited for the wader 
that would come to test the fickle waters of fate. 
“You see it in me, I think,” he chuckled, relaxing a bit to tuck his dark shirt into his dark 
pants and toss himself into the tattered black overcoat that kept him like a brooding crow.  “You 
see yourself.  Burning, but burning happily!” 
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I returned blankly, sitting casually at the table, 
wishing this were the truth.  “You’re rambling psychotically, old man.  Someone should put you 
away.” 
“Put ME away.” he returned with mock incredulity.  “Put ME away, Johnny!.  Ha ha, 
what a joke!  The fun never ends!” 
Abruptly changing tacks, he inclined his head curiously, and cocked his arm openly, as if 
to invite me into its crook that we might walk together, embraced.  “Well, come along, then.  I 
suppose I smell better now, as you required, so it’s off to business.” 
When I didn’t immediately stand to service his request, he dropped his arm, and pouted 
comically.  “Aw, what’s the matter.  Ain’t you gonna play wit’ me.” 
“No, I don’t believe I will.” 
He straightened, and regarded me stoically.  “Now, Johnny, you are on the verge of a 
most disastrous mistake.” 
“Funny, you go from the unlearned hick to the philosopher like somebody flipping a 
switch.  Stupidity is a convenient cover for a sociopath, isn’t it.” 
Grinning, he returned pointedly, “As can be learnedness, Johnny.” 

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151 
“Whichever.  I don’t think I’ll go, after all.  I think I’ll sit right here awhile.  Maybe even 
take a nap.” 
“Okay,” he drawled, “You do that, just that.  Take a nap.  Sleep the day.  On through the 
night.  Stay awhile, Johnny.  Stay awhile.” 
He started away, across the courtyard, around the corner and gone.  I watched him go, 
disbelieving.  It couldn’t be so easy to be rid of something so nasty, I thought. 
I had met that kind many times, after all.  Parasites, every one. 
I lay back, lacing my fingers behind my head casually.  Well, fuck him, then, I thought.  
The sun climbed, unseen, through the weave of the canopy, its unwholesome touch warming me 
where it fell upon my skin.  A foul wind changed back and forth through my hair, gently, with 
the ruffle of a lover’s soothing caresses.  I felt my eyes slide shut, lazily. 
...so I felt sleep coming in that moment, up from the darkness beneath me that existed 
only within my thoughts.  I felt it coming to snatch my mind away and carry it into that unknown 
land where it lives for so many hours through the night. 
Then, with a start, I was snapped awake, sitting bolt upright, as something black and 
nasty scuttled in the shadows near the far wall.  Something that rustled in the unkempt weeds of 
the courtyard with a jerk, and was fled.  Something that had come upon me stealthily, I thought, 
and had been ready to pounce. 
It had snapped a twig with its paw, I thought, and wakened me.  Yet there was another, 
near the corner, its yellow eyes flaring with the moonlight.  The moonlight. I thought dazedly.  
What moon.  What of the sun.   What of the day. 

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Stephen Huff 
152 
Hissing, that unspeakable, loathsome thing skulked around the inner wall, keeping to the 
deep pools of shadow that hid from the moon’s piercing light, rustling through the dead leaves 
and weeds with a raucous abandon.  It had come quietly, but it would not go so demurely. 
With a sudden bolt, it was gone with its companion, around the corner, out of the 
courtyard, and disappeared into the night.  I sat forward with the same savage motion, ready to 
fight or flee for my life. 
Except, it was a contest not to be.  Snapping my head back and forth, I actually forced my 
right hand to slap my own right cheek repeatedly. 
“Fool!” hissed a hideous voice from my disturbing, surreal dreams.  “Fool!  What are you 
doing.” 
 I spun up out of the seat and onto my unsteady feet, immediately collapsing to the bird-
shit strewn cement patio.  Groggily, I registered the touch of human hands upon my shoulders, 
and instinctively jerked away from this assistance to find my own feet. 
“Fool!” she hissed again, her voice as black as her eyes, as black as the rising night.  “Get 
inside!”  She reached for me, her finely boned hands like the claws of death’s angel, reaching for 
my soul from the cold harbor of the evening. 
“I- I-” my tongue felt thick and was stubborn.  “She said... she said not to...” 
“What.  What.” returned the dark woman, confused, reaching for me, clutching me, 
dragging me from the darkness into the light.  The burning yellow light.  A blaze of bonfires, 
where they would roast human beings for suckling pigs.  “Get up!  Get up!  Get up!  They were 
feeding!  It was almost too late!” 

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Stephen Huff 
153 
“Feeding.  Feeding.  What was feeding.” I let her lead me, when she touched her hand 
to my throat, just before my ear, and showed me my own red, running blood.  “No.  No, she 
said...” I choked and sputtered. 
“She said.  She.  Who.”  Yet, even as she spoke, she struggled to recover me, to retrieve 
me.  “If you were listening to her out here, at this time of night, then you’re a bigger fool than I 
thought.” 
With her last word, we were through the doorway and inside the hotel.   It slammed shut 
at our backs, and the clatter of half a dozen bolts let us know we were safe.  I collapsed into a 
convenient divan, and gathered my wits. 
As a swimmer emerging from a cold, deep dive, I came up for air with a gasp.  “Jesus!” I 
belched, touching my bleeding ear.  “I’m cut!” 
“You’re not cut,” she returned dryly, her eyes on the tiny windows that watched through 
the door into the gloom.  “You were bitten.  Idiot.  I should have let you sit out there all night, 
until you were reduced to scattered bones to feed the dogs.” 
“What the hell are you talking about.  I just took a little nap, is all.”  The blood, coming 
so fast and hot at first, was coming slowly now.  Before long, it stopped altogether. 
She scoffed, and went for a towel.  “A nap.  What kind of moron are you.” 
“Yeah, a nap.  What’s the big deal.” 
“Outside.  At night.  And this your, what, first, second day in town.” 
I shook my head.  This must be a part of the dream, I thought.  “So.  What’s your point.” 

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154 
Shaking her head, convinced, apparently, that she was dealing with a low grade dimwit, 
she retrieved a small towel from a serving tray that lingered near the kitchen door.  Tossing this 
across the room, she instructed tersely, “Get up to your room.  Lock the door.  Don’t come out 
until the sun is shining.” 
“What about breakfast.” 
“It’ll keep.” 
It was my turn to scoff.  “Like you kept it for that other guy this morning.” 
She smiled sadistically.  “We all have our own cross to bear, darling.” 
Wiping at the blood that dripped down my neck and onto my only clean shirt, disgusted 
with the turn of events, I stood uncertainly and tottered across the floor.  As I passed, she asked 
softly, “What the hell were you thinking.” 
“That old man... we were going to... I don’t know what we were going to do, but then I 
said no, that I’d rather take a nap, and that’s the last thing I remember.”  I stumbled, and she let 
me lean on her.  She helped me to the stairs and let me loose on the banister.  “What were those 
things.” 
She was beyond hearing.  Glaring, pursing her lips thinly, she spat, “That greasy piece of 
shit.” 
I was taken aback by the vehemence and the cursing.  It seemed so contrary to her 
manner, which was dark and brooding, yet prim and proper, tightly kept, like her long, black 
skirts that covered her to her feet. 

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155 
“Yeah, that’s what I say.  You wouldn’t happen to have an extra baseball bat laying 
around, would you.” 
“Why.” 
“That old guy scares me a little.” 
“Him.” she snorted, dismissing the entire idea of him.  “A minor parasite.  Stay away.” 
“Yeah,” I offered, somewhat embarrassed, as I climbed the stairs with the march of a man 
ascending to his gallows pole, “So I’ve been told.” 
“You didn’t listen the first time.” 
Her insinuations regarding my intelligence were becoming tiresome.  I half turned to start 
back with a smart remark, but she was gone.  With the grace and silence of a hunting feline, 
disappeared. 
Back in my room, I slammed the door, and reached to bolt it, stopped.  “It would serve 
her right!” I gloated, refusing to turn the lock, simply because SHE had told me to do so.  Then I 
thought again, and turned it. 
“Fool!” I mocked viciously.  “Who the hell does she think SHE is.  Get inside.  Stay 
there.  Lock the doors.”  I went to the window, and pulled the curtain aside. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
156 
A face was there!  Smashed against the window, licking, licking at me through the 
glass.  When I swept the curtain aside, it was vanished with a jerk.  I heard it tumble 
down to the ground along an unknown route, and scramble along the alley that ran beside 
the hotel.  A metal trash can was toppled, and scattered its contents onto the sidewalk, 
vouching for my sanity. 
Otherwise, the night was so still, I might have believed myself to be mad.  It was 
a reeking night that hung heavily beneath a skulking moon.  I smelt it, borne on a draft 
through the tightly shut windows.  It smelled of fear, a particular sort of smell that is the 
stench of unbuckled sphincters and steaming armpits and clammy palms. 
As before, the forest was alive with noise, if it lingered innocently without 
outward sign of motion.  A skilled cheat at the slight of hand, it was busy where it could 
not be seen, I guessed. 
It screamed.  It brayed.  It moaned.  It gasped.  It choked.  It cried out in anguish 
and for a lust of blood.  Through all the din, it breathed.  In and out, its respirations the 
suck and blow of a gentle, stinking breeze that pushed its way through my windows and 
into my nostrils relentlessly. 
I let the curtain fall, and tossed myself, fully clothed, onto the bed.  I left the lights 
burning.  While I thought through the long hours of darkness.  While I considered my 
own two hands, that so many supposed to be so black with blood. 
Still, what is a man, I considered eventually, if a man is not what others believe 
him to be.  What is a man, if he is not the reflection of himself as seen within the eyes of 
those that see him.  What did I see, last time I looked.  Fear.  Disturbingly apparent 
terror.  Mistrust.  Doubt.  Suspicion.  Guilt. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
157 
Everything the old man had said, and from the most surprising eyes.  Eyes that 
had belonged to men and women I had genuinely, truly, considered to be my friends.  
That I had once thought would stand by me through any condition, in any regard.  Yet, 
most of them had abandoned me, first thing. 
With the lurid reel of a 35mm film, my memories replayed themselves upon the 
bloody backs of my tightly shut eyelids.  I remembered.  I remembered everything. 
I thought of... her first touch.  Her first real touch. 
I remember how it came in the dark beneath a moon much like the one burning 
through tonight’s midnight volumes.  I remember how we leaned against my new car, me 
pressed against her, her pressed against it.  I remember kissing her with the thrill of a 
virgin that has tasted his first flesh, and me long jaded. 
It was liquid fire, that first touch.  It ran through us.  It was us. 
I knew in the instant.  I think she knew, too.  I knew she was the one. 
Her eyes so dark, that my hostess’ eyes seemed familiar for them.  Her hair so 
black and tied so severely at the back of her head, exposing her perfect face, so lovely 
and soft, that my hostess’ own faced glimmered with a shadow of it.  So I thought of her.  
Of them both.  I considered their juxtaposition within my mind. 
How they seemed to possess me in so short a time.  I was frightened to consider 
it. 
A man should learn from experience, after all, and I had known her once, the 
devil.  For the devil, I was convinced, was a beautiful woman.  She wouldn’t come in the 
guise of cloven hooves and pointed tail.  No, she would come in a soft, shimmering dress, 
with a gleaming, liquid eye and an angelic face.  She would come on a gentle touch that 

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was the endearing caress of a constrictor to consume its prey inexorably yet 
imperceptibly, one cinching grip at a time. 
A love of her was a crushing force to squeeze all life from a man.  Oh, yes, I knew 
her.  From her first touch, I knew her.  I felt the devil in her.  I felt how she burned me.  
Even then, the thrill of it was irresistible.  Undeniable.  All encompassing. 
When she laid her lips to the warm curve of my neck and whispered there such 
depraved secrets, I was enraptured, enthralled, hypnotized.  I was a shiver of pure tingling 
emotion that chased from my toes to the individual roots of every hair on my head and 
back again, coursing through the sinews and subtler tissues of my overwhelmed nervous 
system until I was left a quaking mound of flesh in her hot arms. 
Until I found myself some time later in the grips of a deeper darkness, thrusting, 
thrusting, thrusting into her savagely, urgently, yearning to gauge a depth that was 
fathomless, striving to fill a void that was immeasurable, struggling to become an ancient, 
primordial, unreasoning beast to match the beast she had become. 
Afterward, and despite the fact that I had only met her six hours earlier, she 
turned to curl up in my arms the way a woman will, and she whispered, “I want a big 
wedding.  With everyone there.  Absolutely everyone.” 
I sighed.  It was an old story.  I had heard it many times, but this was the first time 
I listened.  It was the first time I believed. 
“Okay,” I said sleepily, and this was how it all started to unravel 
Such a simple thing, really.  A footstep.  One footstep of ten thousand in the long 
march of my life up to that day.  One footstep.  That might have fallen this way or the 
other, but fell this way, in the end.  Yet, it’s the end that matters, in the course of time. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
159 
Because, I learned eventually, all endings are the beginning of something else.  
Even as all beginnings are, in turn, the end.  Of something.  Somewhere. 
It’s a simple law of nature, but they don’t teach it at the university, and I never 
read it in any book.  I might have hoped it was a lesson I had learned a long, long time 
before that day, yet everyone has their limitations.  Every man has his Achilles’ heel. 
Mine was her.  She was, simply, an obsession.  A deeply seated, unquenchable 
lust that consumed me as a firestorm from the first touch of the match.  She would burn 
me down completely.  I was helpless to withstand her. 
As I considered this, I thought of the old man’s words, and I wondered if his were 
the answers to explain my helplessness.  Perhaps.  It was an easy fit.  Maybe too easy. 
I was leery of the easy fix.  Nothing, I had learned young, was simple or easy.  
Especially that which should be simple or easy.  Be warned, it said, beware.  It’s the 
unsinkable ship, it’s the Titanic, the Hindenburg, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.  It is 
perfection manifest. 
So I should have known, but I was blind.   Even as I suspected I was blind to the 
sinister plots of this place.  Happily blind.  Ignorant.  Unaware. 
I didn’t want to know.  Not really.  Knowing was irrelevant.  Again, I thought of 
the old man’s words.  I considered how it was possible that we were, truly, powerless to 
be other than that which we, individually, were.  I could not be what I am, I realized, 
without having been who and where I had been, without having done what I had done, 
without having suffered all that had been done to me. 
I could not be me, without her.  She was the pigment to paint me.  She was the 
brush stroke to texture me.  She was the frame to hang me. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
160 
Oh, yes.  She was indeed the frame to hang me. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
161 

 

M 

Mother 

After the ‘incident’ that was never mentioned, things changed around him quite a 
bit.  I was surprised, actually, to note the change in him, as I had expected his demeanor 
would return to normal after he sobered up.  Something about that night in Kansas stuck 
with him. 
Yet, I did not feel I was safe.  If anything, I was more afraid than before.  He was 
like a kettle with a corked spout, swelling with each passing minute to explode violently. 
One night, while my mother was doing dishes and I was sitting at the kitchen 
table, working on my homework, he sat down beside me suddenly.  Drunk, as usual, he 
tossed an arm about my shoulders and pulled me close. 
“I love you, John,” he slurred.  “I love you, but let me tell you something, John, 
something that you don’t know.” 
I pulled away, and moved to another seat opposite him, dragging my books and 
notepads around with me.  Pretending to ignore him, I attempted to return to my work. 
“Let me tell you something about a bastard.”  He was talking plainly, but not so 
loudly that my mother could understand him over the rushing water that was purging our 

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dishes of filth.  “A bastard, dear John, has got a particularly long, hard, row to hoe.  You 
want to know why. 
“I’ll tell you why.  For lot’s of different reasons, lot’s of little, tiny, different 
reasons, that’s why. One of them being his sisters, John, and his brothers.  You didn’t 
think about that, did you.  Did you, Mr. Calculator.”  Taking a pull from one of his 
omni-present beers, he belched, and offered, “Let’s say you join the army, or whatever, 
right, and you have to fight a war, say, against the towel heads, John.  Them towel headed 
camel jockeys of the desert, right. 
“There you are, on the front line one night, M-16 in hand, when this guy comes 
charging right at you, John!  What do you do.”  My mother turned to notice him then, but 
dismissed him playfully.  “You shoot him, don’t you.  Right between the eyes, but, wait 
a minute!  What if, John, what if...  What if your own dear daddy was that towel head’s 
daddy.  Did you think of that.  I mean, you don’t KNOW, do you.  You don’t really 
know.”  He gloated, and punched me gently in the arm. 
I stood immediately beside the table, and let him see my fingers flexing straight, 
let him see his throat shining in my burning gaze.  Then I went casually to get a drink, 
because my mother was staring at us, stricken. 
When I returned, as he knew I must to avoid upsetting my mother, he was there, 
waiting.  Ready. 
“So then there’s also this, John... say you’re out one night, right, and you meet 
this really fine babe.  She’s hot, you know, smoking hot, everything you want.  So you 
take her home and you nail her good, don’t you, John, because that’s what a pecker 
makes a man do.  The next day you’re talking like lovers talk near dawn, and one thing 

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Stephen Huff 
163 
leads to another, wham-bam, you find out, guess what.  That’s right!  She’s your sister, 
John!  Your fucking sister!  
“You can never know, because you’re a dirty, little bastard, aren’t you, John.  
Aren’t you.” He waited for a reply smugly, sipping his beer. 
“Yes,” I returned, placating him.  “I’m a dirty little bastard.  Now, will you let me 
finish.” 
He smiled, and hugged me briefly, awkwardly.  I cringed away.  “Sure, John, sure.  I’ll 
let you finish.  While you’re at it, working through all them books, why don’t you look up your 
own daddy.”  With that, he swept my work from the table, onto the floor. 
My mother stood at the sink, and pretended not to notice.  Her hunched back told me she 
would do nothing to intervene. 
I climbed off my seat, and stood at the ready next to the table.  With a snarl, he 
threatened, “You got an ass whooping coming, boy, and you better just take it.  If you try any of 
those fancy finger tricks on me again, I’m just going to have to kick your momma’s ass 
tomorrow during my lunch break, while you’re away at school.” 
He was smug.  He thought he had me. 
I jabbed him directly in the throat.  When he was down, I kicked him in the bridge of his 
nose, breaking it. 
My mother screamed, and snatched me up.  The police came.  An ambulance came.  They 
made him go to the hospital for x-rays of his head.  I hoped he was dying. 
“John, why.” asked my mother later that evening.  I was not arrested, much to my own 
surprise.  “Why would you do something like that.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
164 
“He deserved it.”  I think my tone shocked her more than my words.  It was calm and 
clear.  Deliberate.  “I warned him.  He didn’t listen.  A man’s got to learn somehow.” 
She pursed her lips and stared at me, concerned.  “You warned him.” 
“Not to touch you or me ever again.  I told him I would hurt him.  I meant it.” 
“So that’s why...” she whispered reverently.  “Oh, John, have I told you.  Have I told you 
lately, son, that you’re my little hero.”  She held me tight and she cried so her tears wet my 
cheek and ran down my neck to soak the collar of my t-shirt. 
I stood stiffly in her embrace and let her hold me without returning her affection.  I was 
thinking of what he had said, of his final threat.  He would be back tonight, I knew, but he 
wouldn’t bother me again. 
My mother was another story, however.  True to his word, though not the next day or the 
next, he beat her.  I came home from school one afternoon to find her with a blackened eye.  She 
was sitting at the kitchen table, smoking and drinking his beer, icing her brow with a wet hand 
towel. 
She held me then, too, crying.  She begged me not to hurt him.  I pretended to listen. 
He came home late that night, drunk, as usual.  I knew he was hoping I was asleep, but I 
was wide awake.  Waiting.  Patient as the mechanism of a clock. 
I listened, as he crept by my door in his stocking feet, carrying his shoes, hoping not to 
wake me.  Still, I waited, I let him believe what he wanted to believe. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
165 
Presently, I heard his snoring, and I knew he was passed out in bed with my mother.  I 
tossed my blankets aside and rose, fully dressed, baseball bat in hand.  Down the hall I went, 
brazenly, half-hoping he would wake to see me coming through the door. 
Unceremoniously, I jostled my mother awake, again half-hoping he would stir in time to 
see what was coming.   She snorted and grumbled and smacked her lips.  I told her to get up, and 
dragged her out of bed, onto the floor. 
“John!” she hissed when she saw me standing there with the bat.  “Don’t!  You’ll kill 
him!  You’ll be a murderer, John!  They’ll take you away!” 
“No,” I returned forcefully, pulling her away from the bed, toward the door.  “I know just 
where to hit him.  I looked it up in a book.” 
“A book.”  When she didn’t seem willing to let me go, I gripped her wrists, and removed 
her clutches from my t-shirt. 
“I have to do this, mother.  He has to learn, and this is the only thing he understands.” 
She let me go, nodding her head.  “Okay, John.  Okay.  You know best.” 
That’s right, I thought, I do.  Then I went to the bed.  I beat him savagely. 
He woke up with the first stroke, which cracked across the crook of his knees with a 
sharp report.  I broke his right arm when he raised it to defend himself, but that was the worst of 
it.  The rest were just lumps and bruises. 
Afterward, I went to the phone and dialed ‘911'.  I screamed into the receiver, “Help!  
Help!  My daddy’s killing my mommy!  Hurry!  Hurry!” and I hung up. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
166 
“You little shit!” he screamed.   I raised the bat, and he ducked his head.  “I’ll tell them 
what you done!  They’ll take you off, this time!” 
“No, I don’t think you will,” I returned coolly, leading my mother out of the bedroom to 
wait by the front door.  “If I see you come out of this room, I’m going to break your other arm.  
We’ll talk to them first, and it will be us that they believe.” 
He didn’t come out, but lay in bed, bleeding, moaning, crying, cursing God and me and 
my mother and himself.  When the police arrived, I told them that my father, my step-father I 
mean, had been beating my mother, and that I had used the bat on him, because I thought he 
would kill her. 
She had a blackened eye.  That pissed them off.  They went to the bedroom and 
handcuffed him immediately, despite his protests and his broken arm.  When they weren’t 
looking, I couldn’t help but let a secret little smile slide across my lips. 
One of the policemen, a big, battle scarred veteran of the streets, knelt beside me, as his 
partner dragged his prisoner through the front door and out to the squad car.  He asked, “You did 
that, kid.  With the bat.” 
“That’s right.” 
“You might have killed him.” 
I nodded.  “I could have.  Easy, but I wanted what’s worst for him.” 
“Worst.” 
“Yeah.  Living is worst for him.  Death would have been too easy.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
167 
The cop appraised me with a new eye, leaning back a bit.  “You’re a cool little character, 
you know that.” 
I felt my eyebrows rise.  Butterflies stirred my guts for the first time.   He knew. 
“What do you mean.” I prompted. 
“That bruise on your mother’s face,” he returned, smiling.  “It’s hours old, and your 
daddy’s so drunk, he can hardly walk, much less beat someone.” 
I glared at him.  “He’s not my daddy.” 
“Yeah, well, don’t worry, kid.  Your secret’s safe with me.  We’ll charge him with a 
simple assault.”  He stood and ruffled my hair.  “That’ll keep him in a cage for a few days.  
Maybe he’ll cool off.” 
“Maybe.  Either way, I’m not afraid.  I’m never afraid.” 
The cop grunted and nodded.  “I can see that.  Now listen, kid, don’t think you have a 
license to bust your old man up every time he crosses you, just because I’m letting you off this 
one time.  I don’t want to send the wrong message, here, understand.”  I nodded.  “I guess you 
have to do what it takes to protect your mother and yourself, you know, but just... be careful.  
These things can get out of hand awful quick.  You get mad and get to arguing and the next thing 
you know, a gun goes off.” 
“I wasn’t mad.  He just has to learn, that’s all.” 
“So, you’re going to teach him.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
168 
“I’m going to teach him to leave us alone.  I don’t care what else he does.” 
“Jesus Christ, kid, are you for real.” 
I remember to this day how our eyes met.  At first, he looked at me as a man will 
a child, with condescending pity, but within seconds his demeanor changed.  He was 
afraid. 
“I don’t like to be hurt.  I don’t like for my momma to be hurt.” 
“Yeah, okay.  Okay, but you just remember what I said, you hear.  This state has 
prisons for kids, same as grown-ups.” 
He took my mother aside then and spoke with her privately in hushed yet 
animated whispers.  They often glanced in my direction conspiratorially.  I thought about 
it a moment; I considered his tone, his face, his posture, and I realized that he knew.  He 
knew what my father, my step-father I mean, had been doing to me.  To us both.  I 
figured he had seen it often before, and would doubtless see it again before he was 
finished with the job, or the job was finished with him.  I knew what he was telling my 
mother.  I knew what his advice would be. 
Just as I knew it was too late to help.  Where were you, I wondered, five years 
ago, when she married the sorry son of a bitch.  Where were you then to tell her about 
the evil that may blossom in a man’s heart.  Where was anybody to do it then, when it 
needed doing. 
Afterward, as I pretended to sleep in the dark of my mother’s bedroom at her side, 
I heard her speaking softly into the darkness, whether to herself or to her dreams, I don’t 
know.  She begged God to help her with me.  She begged God for my soul.  She 
promised the devil her own, if he would just let me be. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
169 

 

N 

No Place Special 

She said nothing to me the next morning.  Breakfast came, same as the day 
before, and was removed with a sly smile.  Just moments before Francis came down the 
stairs. 
He stood in the doorway to the kitchen for a moment, hands on his hips, then he 
stomped off to brood on the porch.  This time, I noted, he wisely chose not to confront 
our hostess with his hopeless cause.  Maybe he would make it, after all. 
Sucking my teeth, I found him at the porch rail, glaring at the town blackly.  He 
heard me step out onto the wooden slats, which betrayed me with the bass beat of a drum 
at each step. 
“You want to go see something... interesting, mister.” 
I shrugged.  “That depends,” and joined him at the rail, leaning my elbows 
alongside his.  “Interesting how.” 
He rolled over to one elbow and faced me squarely.  “Oh, about as interesting as 
your trip out of town yesterday.  Yeah, I heard about it.  We all heard about it.  Lot’s of 
them laughed to hear it.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
170 
“Not you.” 
“No, not me.  Something like that isn’t funny to me.  Do you want to come, or 
not.” 
“Where to.” 
“Just down the road.  I got a spot in the woods, across the way from the Town 
Store.  You know the place.” 
“Run by an... an unhappy old woman.”  I could think of nothing kinder. 
“That’s the one.” 
I shrugged again.  “What the hell.  I don’t give a shit if I do.” 
I supposed he wanted me to drive, as I noticed how most folks in town were 
without transportation.  So I reached for my keys. 
Shaking his head, he motioned for me to forget about it and follow him.  Down 
the stairs we went, around the corner and through town, the same way he had left 
yesterday morning.  I followed his stalking pace as best I could manage. 
I was a long legged athlete, two years from a professional career, yet I was hard 
put to keep up.  We followed a cluttered street through town at a half-jog, mile after mile, 
until it came to a dead end at the bottom of a hill, where a creek ran east to west through 
the forest and cut the pavement in half. 
Hopping the creek, he was expert at the stones and knew just where to step to 
keep from soiling his dusty loafers.  I revised my opinion of him a bit, as I followed him 
through the forest now, along a narrow foot trail that led through the drooping ferns 
beneath the overshadowing canopy.  We were dappled with its chaotic shadow and 
steeped in its rotting stench, and I thought it all seemed to suit him too well.  I had 

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considered him a hardcore city boy, but I could see now that Francis was a bit more than 
met the eye. 
After an hour or so without speaking, he slowed, and turned to follow another 
shallow stream west, where it led beneath the highway via a culvert.  Panting, he hovered 
at the forest’s edge, eyeing the street both ways. 
Between his choking breaths, he glanced at the unseen sun, where it shone through the 
trees.  “We have to hurry, or we’ll miss it.” 
“Miss what.”  I panted, wondering if it was worth all this effort, and wondering how I 
should react if it turned out the little man had wasted my time. 
He was off again without a reply, ducking into the culvert and running through its length 
in a waddle to sidestep the tepid flow of dank water that washed through it.  Cursing, I followed, 
not so adept as Francis at finding the best place for my footsteps, so my socks were soon soaked 
with the foul, reeking water. 
Minutes later, we followed a dim trail through the foliage to a hollow that he found near 
the top of a low hill.  It was formed beneath the massive sprawl of a gigantic tree’s root bolus, 
which had been eroded from the earth by countless violent storms.  We passed through a natural 
cathedral of dangling rootlings that reeked of wet earth, which was the stench of the grave, I 
thought, until we emerged at the far side, where he stopped at last. 
Panting and heaving, we struggled to catch our breath with burning lungs.  “Good,” he 
panted, “We made it.  They should be along any minute, now.” 
“They.”  I panted back, “They who.” 
“The outsiders.” 
“Outsiders.  What sort of outsiders.” 

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“Outsiders,” he returned doggedly, “As in, they don’t live around here.  Get it.” 
I shook my head obtusely.  Maybe it was the run.  It had been a while since I had worked 
out, after all, and I was years gone from Francis’ twenty something physique. 
“Maybe you could start making sense, here, Francis,” I reported indecently.  “I’m starting 
to get pissed off, and I itch like crazy.”  In fact, I could not help but scratch myself.  “You didn’t 
drag me through poison ivy, did you.” 
He shook his head.  “Maybe.  That doesn’t matter right now.  Look.  Do you see.” 
I followed the jut of his suddenly pointing finger.  Through the dreary ferns and despite 
the forest’s concealing shade, I saw a familiar clapboard structure, its exterior gone gray for a 
lack of paint and the bleaching sun that so rarely shined. 
“So.” 
“Watch.” 
I watched.  The gaunt old man presently emerged and climbed into his ancient Ford, 
starting its motor with a grind of its ageing electric starter.  Its gears ground and grated, as it 
reversed out of the dirt lot and directly onto the road, fearless of oncoming traffic. 
I thought the old man might head off in the direction of the bridge, and wondered if this 
was what I had come to see, when the old man wheeled his car around and pointed its radiator 
cap toward town.  He puttered up and down the hills and out of sight, and I was surprised to see 
how far we had come so quickly. 
“So.” I started again.  He shushed me with a silent finger. 

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The old woman came out onto the store’s high front porch now.  I heard the old screen 
door screech open and slam shut on its un-oiled spring.  She stood there, her brow shaded by a 
cupped hand, and she took a slow turn of the forest.  He backed up into the shadows, pushing me 
behind him, when her head turned our way. 
I thought she might have seen us, when her gaze paused in our direction.  She seemed to 
be sniffing the wind, like some loathsome hound that would track a scent.  Then her survey 
continued, unperturbed. 
Apparently contented that she was alone, the old lady kicked the rusting metal chairs into 
place, stomped a helpless insect that was unfortunate enough to find itself in her presence, then 
she screech-banged the porch door open and shut again, and was gone.  I waited patiently for 
many heartbeats for something further to happen. 
When nothing did, I offered once more, “So.” 
He elbowed me silent with a hiss and pointed again, this time back along the road toward 
the bridge, which loomed, barely seen, in the haze of the distance.  I looked, but I didn’t see. 
Since his head was cocked to one side curiously, as though listening, I listened, also.  I 
cupped my hand to my ear, and was, for the first time, thankful for the forest’s silence.  I heard 
nothing.  At first.  Then it came to me with the stinking, sucking breeze, a sound of wheels on 
pavement, a sound of a modern engine driving the wheels along. 
I watched a dim shape move through the haze beyond the bridge, apparently bound in our 
direction.  It crossed the river and came on, topping the hills, larger and larger each time it 

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appeared.  Until it was close enough to see in detail.  Until it pulled off the main road and into 
the dusty lot of the ‘Town Store’. 
Though the distance was too great to allow me to read what was printed on the many 
bumper stickers that adorned the truck’s tailgate and bumper, I saw enough of the symbols to 
recognize swastikas and the Confederate flag.  When the occupants at last exited the vehicle, I 
was not surprised to see how they wore their hair cut short and how they huddled into oversized 
fatigues with many suspicious, nervous glances in all directions. 
They mounted the steps with a surly cautiousness.  One of them lingered on the porch, 
watching, his hands concealed within the voluminous pockets of the fatigue jacket he wore, 
though the morning was warm. 
We waited for a short time.  Presently, they all exited the store, and descended the steps, 
carrying a series of apparently heavy burdens, which were tightly wrapped in burlap.  Several 
more trips from the store to the back of the truck seemed to finish it.  They tied a tarpaulin down 
tight over their obviously illicit contraband, climbed into the truck’s cab, and backed out onto the 
road, much the same as the gaunt old man had done only minutes earlier.  They, however, did not 
turn round and head into town.  Instead, they drove off in the direction of the bridge, the same 
way they had come.  Up the hills and out of sight, until they were across the river, and lost to the 
hazy distance. 
“What the hell.” I breathed.  Had I imagined yesterday, or was I imagining today. 
He smiled, and pushed me back into the cover of the shadows.  “You see.  I told you it 
was interesting.” 

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175 
“Son of a bitch,” I replied crudely.  “What was that stuff they loaded.” 
Francis shrugged.  “I can’t be certain, but I don’t think it was Bibles.” 
I agreed by shaking my head, turning my gaze on the obscured ‘Town Store’.   “Yeah, 
you’re probably right.  Looked like drugs or explosives or something.” 
“If I know Bonnie,” he returned almost reverently.  “It’s explosives.  Who knows.” 
“Always the same thing.” 
“Give or take.  Sometimes it’s more obvious.  Once, I saw her serve up a fifty caliber 
machine gun.  Great big fucker, it was, too.  They loaded it into a step van and drove off with it, 
slick as you like.” 
“What the hell for.” 
“How should I know.  What do I look like, some kind of clairvoyant.”  Exasperated, he 
pushed past me, back the way we had come, and he stood in the dappled shadows on the far side 
of the hill.  Something about the way his fingers worked back and forth to his mouth told me he 
longed for a cigarette.  “It’s the damnedest thing, but they come and go almost every day and 
night.  Always different people, different cars, different plates.  Sometimes,” he breathed 
reverently, casting a worried glance over his shoulder in the direction of the Town Store, as I 
joined him, “The plates are from different countries, European like.  Explain that.” 
I shrugged.  “I can’t, but I think I need to get back to town and start the car this way.” 
He shook his head.  “Don’t waste your time.  It’ll be the same as yesterday for you.” 
“Not for them.” 

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176 
“Not for them,” he agreed, shaking his head contrarily.  “There’s something about it I 
can’t figure.  I think, if I could just figure it, I would understand everything, you know.  Only, it 
makes no sense, at all.” 
“Oh, I don’t know….”  I returned softly, starting down the hill to the footpath and town.  
“Maybe it makes perfect sense.” 
“How so.”  Francis caught up, snatching a fern leaf from the greenery and twirling it 
absently with his fingers as we marched. 
“It seems to me that this is a strange sort of town in a lot of ways, but especially in the 
way of its laws.  All is permitted and nothing denied.  What better place to purchase a fifty 
caliber machine gun, and nobody to know.” 
“Yeah, I guess.  I can just imagine the trouble THAT must have caused.” 
“Exactly.  This place is nothing if it is not about trouble.  This place and that woman.  
Christ, she actually scares me, you know.   An old woman like that.” 
“Me, too, but then, most of the people in this town scare me.  Even that little girl with the 
pigtails.  Especially her, maybe.” 
I grunted to agree.  We marched silently for a time, our footsteps the forest’s only sound, 
save for its rank respiration.  Presently, we arrived at the creek that separated the forest from the 
town’s outskirts.  There we paused to sit on the jumbled rocks that lined the draw, where we 
tossed small stones into the lazy trickle of the current, each thinking private thoughts. 
Before long, Francis asked, “What will you do now, Johnny.” 
I glanced up sharply.  “Johnny.” I repeated dourly. 

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He glanced away and was nervous.  “Yeah, sure, that’s your name, ain’t it.” 
Relenting, I skipped a flat pebble twice across the creek’s half-stagnant surface.  “Some 
call me that.” 
“So, what will you do now.” 
“What’s to do.”  I tossed another stone.  “Sit and think for a while, then think and sit.  
Maybe even take a nap.  Until it’s time for dinner.” 
“Just like that.” 
“What do you want me to do, Francis.” 
He seemed to roll his answer unspoken about his tongue for a moment.  Then he 
swallowed what he would say, and kept still.  We tossed stones alternately while the sun, unseen, 
climbed to zenith. 
Shattering the silence, I suddenly wondered aloud, “Where does she get it all, do you 
think.” 
He shrugged.  “I wondered that same thing.  It’s a small place, and there’s nothing around 
back.  I never see anybody bring anything in, but they all leave with something.” 
“Maybe she’s pulling it out of her ass.” 
We laughed.  Francis offered, “That’s a picture I’d rather not frame.” 
“Well,” I conceded presently, standing to brush the dirt from my hands and from the seat 
of my pants, “It’s true this is a strange place.  Nothing like I’m used to, anyway.  So I think it 
safe to suppose we shall never know the how’s and why’s of it all.  Maybe we should just forget 
about it.” 

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178 
“Like hell.”  He followed me across the stream and up the bank to the pavement on the 
far side.  “I want out, Johnny, even if you don’t.” 
“Who says I give a shit what you want, kid.” 
He stopped following to stand at the edge of the pavement.  I kept walking for a time, but 
a prickling feeling at the back of my neck gave me pause.  I half-turned to catch his eye, 
expecting to find him staring at me blackly.  Yet he was not looking at me.  His gaze was 
directed to one side, into the trees. 
I turned to look, also.  There, just beyond the pavement in the spotted shadows of the 
canopy, stood the gaunt old man.  Watching us with a severe intent. 
“Where you boys been.” 
Sucking a chestful of stinking air, I blustered.  “That’s none of your fucking business, old 
man.” 
Tucking his arms into the interior of his coveralls, shirtless as he was, the old man 
stepped out of the shade and onto the street.  “Maybe not.  Maybe so.  Lot’s of things are none of 
my business, boy, and still, I can’t hardly leave ‘em alone.  So I says again, where you boys 
been.” 
“Fishing.” 
He stood there facing us, turning his gaze from each of us to the other in turn.  “Mmm 
hmm, and I pull my pud to give milk.”  He cracked a smile to expose the joke.  “Can I give you 
young fellers a ride back to town.” 
Francis inserted quickly, “No, we’ll walk.” 

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I vetoed with, “Sure.  Why not.  I always liked antique cars.” 
He led us down the street to the corner, where his car was parked just out of sight.  I 
climbed into the front passenger seat.  We waited briefly for Francis, who hesitated and seemed 
afraid.  I grinned to let him know it was okay, and he climbed into the seat behind me. 
The old man fired up his Ford, and we started off with a rattling jerk.  “You got to be 
careful of Bonnie, you know,” he offered eventually.  “She don’t like nobody to know her 
business.” 
“I couldn’t tell,” retorted Francis petulantly. 
“I suppose you’re both wonderin’ what the hell it’s all about.  Hmm.  That it.”  I nodded 
to show it was.  “Thought so.  It’s good, you bein’ honest with me, son.  That’ll go a long way 
with a man like me.  See, I been on this side of the truth, and I been on the other side, too, same 
as most men, I guess.  After a time, a man gets to know what he likes about most things, and 
what he don’t like.  The thing about the truth is, it’s good, flat ground.  A man can plant his feet 
on it and stand sure.  The thing about a lie is, it’s good for being bad, but that’s all.  A lie will 
never stand.  It’s like swampy ground covered over with a green grass.  Step out onto it, but not 
to stand.  Step out onto it to sink and drown.”  He cranked his bony head around atop his long, 
bony neck, and he flicked a pointed glance at Francis.  “Like you, boy, I can tell... you’ll drown 
in it every time.  Nobody get’s nothin’ from you, but it’s bullshit.” 
He turned back to the road just in time to avoid the curb.  “But you, mister,” he added, 
referring to me, “I could tell about you first time I laid eyes on you, same way.  I been here long 

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enough to know what I know.  Some come in and I think, ‘there’s a fellah that’s gonna stay’.  
Sometimes it’s the other way around.  I see somebody like you, and I know... I just know, is all.” 
“Know what.” 
Enigmatically, he was finished with that part of it.  Returning to our original subject, he 
said, “Hey, there, young fellah!  Bonnie knows about your little nest up there on the hill.  What 
do you think about that.” 
I didn’t turn to see, but I knew Francis would be chewing his fingernails.  The old man 
added, “So maybe you better just stay down from there for a spell.  Or maybe find some other 
place to do your peepin’ from.” 
“What...” I started, stopping myself abruptly, as I could find no way to broach the matter 
gently. 
“Mmm hmm, you want to know.  Well, so would I.  Like I told you, Bonnie don’t like 
nobody messin’ about in her business.  Not even me.”  He shifted gears with a jerk of his rail thin 
right arm, and we accelerated to a blinding thirty miles per hour.  “She says ‘get out’ and I get.  
That’s all.” 
“What is she to you, old man.” I asked, making conversation now. 
“Oh,” he groaned, wheeling us around to the left, back toward the little highway, “I 
dunno.  My wife, I guess, since we been together for so long, but not to my mind.  More, we’re 
just... partners.” 
“Business partners.” wondered Francis. 

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The old man’s shoulders hunched.  He apparently had small use for Francis.  “Once.  A 
long, long time ago.” 
“Now.” I prompted. 
“Just partners, is all.  She says, and I do.  Like that.” 
“That’s not a partnership, old man,” responded Francis, “That’s a woman and her dog!” 
and he laughed raucously. 
“Shut the fuck up, Francis.”  He was instantly still. 
The old man tilted his head, beaten.  “Naw, it’s okay.  He’s right.  I’m her dog.  Like he 
says.  Have been for years.  Truth is,” he offered, somewhat abashed by his own confession, 
“She scares me. She’d never let me be, not now, not after all this time, for fear I’d talk about 
something, I don’t know what.  So I keep my tail tucked and my ears back and I just try to stay 
out of her way, now a’days.” 
“It wasn’t always like that between you two.” 
He shrugged.  “I dunno.  I used to think so, but now that I look back at it all, I can see 
how it was all her.  Every step of the way, it was her at the leash and me wearin’ the collar.”  The 
old man, grunting, worked the Ford’s brakes and clutch.  We rolled to a half-stop at the 
intersection with the main highway, and he heaved the rattle-trap hard right, onto the blacktop to 
straddle the white line.  “We done a lot of things, you bet, most of ‘em bad.  I always thought 
back then that it was me in the lead and her in tow, but it weren’t so.  Now, I see how it was her 
needin’ this and wantin’ that, which was enough to drive me from one thing to the next, same as 

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most men will for their women.  Only, with Bonnie, it was more than that... it wasn’t enough that 
I do for her, you know.  It was better if I do for her and it be violent and bloody.” 
Shifting gears and tones in the same instance, he continued with, “Do you know she was 
shot once, through and through both thighs.  She was down for three weeks, but once she started 
heeling she was like a hound in heat.  It was the blood and the pain and the wounds that done it, 
that stirred her so.  I never fucked her so hard as I did during the month that followed, and it was 
a God awful mess, too, with all the blood and her screaming like I was murderin’ her slow.”  He 
grimaced and I grimaced and felt my stomach sour to think of it.  “She was like an animal, 
fellahs.  Eggin’ me on and screamin’ and cryin’ and moanin’.  I could never tell if I was hurtin’ 
her or makin’ her feel good.  Maybe, I figured after a time, it was the same thing to her. 
“Some folks don’t feel good unless they’re hurtin’.  You ever meet one of those.  That 
was when I first started to fear her, you know.  I couldn’t figure it.  I mean, I was a bad man, 
don’t get me wrong, void of conscience and pity, but Bonnie... she was... worse.  For her, it was 
more than an absence of pity.  Badness was the only fun in her life.  She wasn’t smilin’, unless 
she was holdin’ a gun on somebody, fixin’ to squeeze the trigger.  Then, she smiled like the 
damned devil.  To this day, the only way I can get her to feelin’ good is to reminisce on them old 
days, remindin’ her of all that blood and terror.  She’s ghoulish like that.” 
I was staring out the window at the drab little town, where it could be glimpsed through 
the pine forest that lined the highway’s shoulders.  It was a nasty place, I thought, full of nasty 
people.  The shame of it all was the fact that I didn’t have to wonder why I was here. 
“Hey, now, what’s this.” croaked the old man suddenly. 

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183 
I turned to follow his gaze out the front windshield.  There, at the bottom of the hill we 
had just topped, stood a familiar black form alongside the road, his arm out to thumb a ride in the 
opposite direction, the way out of town.  As we neared, I could see he was smiling broadly, 
cackling madly no doubt, his crooked teeth the only thing to be seen beneath the shadow of his 
broad, floppy hat. 
“Stop,” I told the driver.  “Pick him up.” 
Francis groaned through his nose, but said nothing.  We rolled to a halt in the opposite 
lane, facing the wrong direction, to be closest to our latest passenger. 
Squawking like an old crow, the vagabond climbed onto the Ford’s running board and 
leaned through the old man’s open window.  “Well, now,” he cackled, pushing his hat back on 
his forehead a bit, “Ain’t this a sight.   What a merry crew of freaks!  Huh, Johnny.  And that 
one there in the back, the biggest freak of you all, ha ha!” 
Francis bristled.  “Fuck you, asshole.” 
“You want a lift, or not.” growled the driver impatiently. 
“That depends on where you’re all goin’ in such a hurry, but it seems obvious to me that 
you’re goin’ the wrong way!  Unless you was just swingin’ by to pick me up, ha ha!” 
“We’re goin’ into town!” growled the old man.  “Now get the fuck off my runnin’ board, 
afore I drag your ass down the street!”  H started off without further warning. 
The old crow clung to the side of the Ford, and managed his way inside through the back 
door, without stepping onto the pavement.  Once inside, the place immediately began to stink. 

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“Jesus Christ, old man,” I bellowed, “What is it with you.  That bath yesterday didn’t 
stick long, did it.” 
“We’re not all so lucky as to have a nice, warm bed for the night, Johnny,” he returned, 
feigning insult.  “Some of us got to sleep in the gutter with the varmints!” 
“Smells like you been sleepin’ in a warm pile of shit!” offered the driver. 
The old crow sniffled himself daintily.  “Yeah, well, maybe I was.  I can’t say for sure, 
since it was dark.  What about you, Johnny.  How’d you sleep last night.”  When I offered no 
response to encourage him, he added, “I would’ve insisted you get inside, you know, except your 
mind was made.  I could tell there was no talkin’ you out of it.  It’s somethin’ I noticed.” 
“What’s that.” wondered the daft Francis.  I wondered why the youth encouraged the 
foul old bastard. 
“I’ve noticed how somebody that wants to be rid of me usually wants to be rid of me real 
extra special bad.  Though I don’t know why.  I’m pleasant comp’ny, ain’t I.” 
“Pleasant like a raw dick skin!” hooted our gaunt driver. 
“Yeah,” chimed Francis, “Like a burning piss!” 
I smiled, despite my foul mood.  “Where were you going.” I asked. 
“No place special, ‘cept maybe to hell, if I don’t change my ways.”  We all laughed 
again.  “Naw, Johnny, I was waitin’ for you.  When I seen you take off like you done this 
mornin’ with this... this pencil neck, I started to follow, but you guys were in some kind of a 
hurry, let me tell ya’, and I wasn’t nearly so anxious.  So I decided to wait for you, Johnny.”  He 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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185 
winked, just in time for me to turn and catch it.  “Knowin’ like I do how you’d be back.  
Eventually.” 
“Say,” drawled our ancient driver, turning his own head stiffly to catch sight of my dark 
companion, “I know you, don’t I.  You came into town some time ago, as I recollect.  I can’t 
remember seein’ you around for a while.” 
“No, I’ve been... away,” returned the old crow. 
“Yeah.” responded the driver stiffly, “Away to where.” 
“Oh, different places.  This place... that place... down the road a ways.” 
“Down the road.” repeated Francis.  “What the hell does that mean.  You get out of 
town.” 
“From time to time.”  The old guy played it cool.  He leaned way back, and turned his 
gaze casually out the window.  “When I got somewhere to go.  Unlike you boys, that’ll never get 
out.  Not even with ten thousand Johnny Bullets to glom onto.”  The other two stiffened.  “That’s 
right, but don’t worry.  I done told him all about it already.  Ain’t that right, Johnny.   I told him 
all about your kind.  About that dark woman at the hotel, and the little girl thing that twiddles its 
pigtails.  He knows what you want, and he ain’t fooled.” 
“I don’t need another mouth, old man,” I growled softly.  “Besides, I hadn’t thought I’d 
go anywhere soon.  If I did, there is no way in hell I would take you people with me.  You can 
just forget about it.” 
“Oh, I don’t know, Johnny, there is a way in hell you might take one of us.  In case 
you’re wonderin’, gents, one of us ain’t gonna be either of you.” 

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186 
“Who says I had plans on goin’ anywhere.” croaked the driver, and I wondered if the two 
of them might be distant cousins. 
“You did, drivin’ this old Ford all over town, stirrin’ up the dust ever since Johnny come 
into town, and you, Francis,” the old crow dragged the name through his nasty mouth, rendering 
it the vilest insult.  “Still missin’ breakfast, I hear.  How’s a man gonna work his way out of this 
place, when he can’t even get a cup of coffee in the mornin’.  Why, Johnny’s even been over to 
the map man’s house, and do you see that ol’ nigger anywhere near.  Seems to me, if Johnny 
needed anybody for a runnin’ buddy, it might have been the map man.  He, at least, has 
somethin’ to offer, ‘sides his own black, dimply ass, ha ha!” 
The Ford rumbled into town, and squealed to a halt on its protesting drum brakes at that 
familiar stop sign.  “Now I remember you, sure,” hissed the driver.  “Get the fuck out.”  He spat 
out the window to pontificate. 
The old crow settled deeper into his musty seat.  “Still,” he hedged, his tone almost 
playful, “A man’s gonna have room for his friends, you know.” 
“Friends,” spat the driver acidly.  “What the fuck do you know ‘bout friends.  You never 
had one.  You never been one.” 
“Did I say ‘friends’.  I meant ‘partners’.”  Francis sniggered.  “A man’s gonna have room 
for his partners.” 
“So’s you got some place to stick your knife, right.  I remember you.  I remember what 
you done.  We all wondered what had become of you.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
187 
The foul black crow leaned suddenly forward, and gripped the driver’s whitened, balding 
head between his two hands, kissing its pate gently.  Startled, the driver let his foot off the clutch 
and the Ford jumped to an abrupt, jolting halt.  Flustered and cursing, the old guy slammed his 
door open, and, more spry than I had thought possible, leapt out onto the running board, spinning 
around and pulling a huge .45 caliber automatic handgun from one of the voluminous overall’s 
many pockets. 
“Now let’s you just get outta that fuckin’ car, mister!” growled the old man, and I thought 
a whispy presence of his youth flared to life within him.  Decades dropped away from the flesh 
around his eyes, while they burned madly with rage. 
“Hey,” mollified the crow, “It was just a joke.  Can’t you take a joke, ha ha.” 
“I said get the fuck out!” and he thumbed the hammer back.  When nobody moved, he 
fired point blank into the backseat. 
Francis screamed.  Or maybe it was me.  The interior of the car lit up brilliantly with the 
strobe muzzle flash.  My ears rang savagely.  The old driver’s mouth was moving, but I couldn’t 
hear the words.   Francis was working feverishly to either open his own door or push the old man 
out with his kicking feet, or both.  Abandoned, the car was rolling. 
I jammed the lever into gear to stop it.  The crazy old man fired again.  And again.  When 
I looked back, the rear seat was empty, its passenger side door swinging wide. 
Apparently satisfied with a hard day’s work well done, he let the handgun’s hammer 
softly down again, and tucked the weapon away.  Climbing back into his seat, and starting the 
car with his left foot, the old man offered, “Much obliged,” slamming his door.  “I thought I had 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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188 
the brake down.  I must be gettin’ too old for this.”  He spun the wheel almost lovingly to the 
right.  “I sure would hate to wreck her!” 
I shook my head, amazed.  “But you’ll shoot holes into it.” 
He cackled and shook his head.  “What, that business back there.  It was just show, is all.  
Blank cartridges.  Made ‘em myself.  What do you think about that.”  I joined his cackle with 
my own. “Thought I might need ‘em, when I heard you was exchangin’ words with that little 
fellah in the funny suit.  If I knew you had takin’ up with that other’n, I might have loaded it with 
lead!  I don’t like that nasty shit.  He done some bad things in this town, even for a town full of 
badness and bad men.  Lot’s of folks got it in for him still, on account of what he done.”  He 
scratched his head.  “I thought he was dead for sure, though...” 
“What did he do.” 
“Do.  Ah, hell, it don’t mean nothin’, anyway.  It ain’t important, no how.  Now that we 
got a minute to ourselves, we got to take care of business.” 
“What sort of business.”  I was suspicious, it seemed everybody had business with me.  
During my former life, I had hungered for fame, but, as a starving man grown fat at a banquet, I 
was quit of it and the bad taste it left in my mouth.  This, especially, was not the time or the place 
for being well known. 
“Now, now, don’t get flustered.  It’s not that sort of business.”  Hunched over his over-
sized steering wheel, he jerked it back and forth to keep us in the center of the lane, and he said, 
“I been too many years in this world, boy.  I’ve known for a long time how ever’ day is one more 
closer to the last.  I ain’t got long.  Not even in this place.  Still, I had more than I deserved. 

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189 
“Like you, I come in young.  I thought it was a good thing.  We both did, me and Bonnie.  
Was a lot of folks that wanted us dead by then, and I guess maybe we deserved killin’, after all 
we done.  Like I says, we was bad youngsters, givin’ to breakin’ the law in ever’ possible way.  
It was fun for awhile.  I’d probably still be at it, I suppose, if I hadn’t rolled across that damned 
bridge one afternoon, never to pass back the other way.  I heard C.J. kept at it until he was a ripe 
old man, like me, and was killed in a deal gone bad.”  He sighed wistfully, clucking his tongue 
and shaking his head.  “Now that’s the way to go. 
“It’s for the best, though, you know.  I heard not long after how we had been killed, 
though I checked myself all over to be sure they got it wrong.  I don’t know who them two 
young car thieves was to this day, a couple out for a joy ride, I guess, maybe even playin’ up like 
they was us, you know. 
“‘Cause crime, the sort of crime we was doin’, has a way of makin’ a man, or a woman, 
famous.  You know that.  It’s a rare man, who’s name is known long after they bury him.  I’m 
just such a man.  Even though I ain’t even been buried yet, not really, any how.  I bet folks’ll be 
sayin’ my name for another hun’erd years from the day!  Mine and Bonnie’s.  All on account of 
how we was wild, young killers. 
“Some men will work all their lives, real sort of work, you know, and never get an inch in 
the papers, outside of their own obituaries.  Hells bells, but most people you ask can’t name 
more’n a half dozen presidents, I bet, and they was all great men!  Great men and good. 
“While others... others live but a few brief years on the far side of the law, doin’ whatever 
they take a notion to do, like me, and they’re remembered forever.  Funny, ain’t it.” 

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190 
“Yeah, life is fucked up.” 
“Well, we got to be too famous near the end of it all.  We couldn’t go nowhere, but we 
would come across pointin’ fingers and them whispers.  You know about the whispers, I reckon. 
Finally, we was in this runnin’ gun battle, you know.  That’s when Bonnie was shot.  My own 
brother was killed, shot in the head, and his wife captured.  Though that last matter was no great 
loss, let me tell ya.  We went back down to Texas and holed up in an old cabin I knew over in 
Grand Prairie, not far away from my daddy’s place in West Dallas.  We stayed outta sight for a 
spell.  When things got too hot and Bonnie was well enough, we hit the road.  We just started 
drivin’ and drivin’, day and night, until we came across this place.  Not long after, we heard what 
had happened in Louisiana.  We figured it was the law, coverin’ their own mistake with a 
bullshit story, and we was happy enough to let it be. 
“I seen pictures of it years latter.  Them two kids sure did look somethin’ like me and 
Bonnie, but they was so shot up that you couldn’t really be sure.  ‘Cept, I was sure.  Bonnie was 
sure.  It weren’t us, but, then again, we was in no place to tell anybody, was we.  So the story 
played out.  Maybe that’s one reason why we’ll live forever. 
“If we had rotted away in prison until we was ripe and old, folks would’ve had plenty of 
time to forget about us.  Like they forgot about C.J..  Like they forgot about Buck.  You 
remember Valentino. It’s sort of the same thing, what happened with our story.  If that faggot 
had lived another five years, the world would have been flat quit of him.  Only, he died at just 
the right moment, didn’t he.  Almost like it was part of a plan.  We didn’t have no plan, but it 

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191 
worked out that way, just the same.  It gives me to wonder sometimes, late at night when I wish I 
could sleep, you know, about how much of this world was built up around such happenstance. 
“So I got this feelin’ about you, youngster.  Right off when I seen you come through the 
door the other day, I knew.  I could see it in your eyes.” 
“See what.”  We rolled to a stop in front of the hotel.  The motor rumbled, idling, and I 
didn’t immediately climb out. 
“You had the look of a man that had seen himself in the papers.  Too many times.  I been 
here a lot of years with Bonnie, like I been sayin’.   I seen all kinds come walkin’ down that road, 
our place bein’ their first stop, usually.  Some famous, like us.  Most just average, ordinary.  All 
scared.  All runnin’ from somethin’.  Them that come in runnin’ from their own infamy, they got 
a particular manner about ‘em, and it’s a manner I know well.  Havin’ worn it, myself, you 
know.  So I guessed right off you was somethin’ big.  Somethin’ diff’rent.” 
When he didn’t seem bound to finish, and was instead content to simply stare at me, 
grinning, I prompted with, “And.” 
“And, I thought I should help you.  Before you settled in to stay a while, and it got to be 
too late.” 
“Who says I need help.” 

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Stephen Huff 
192 
“I says, that’s who.  ‘Cause I been here a spell.  I seen ‘em come.  I seen ‘em stay.  
They all do, you know, ‘cause that’s what they all came in searchin’ for, a place to stay.  
Except, stayin’ is the very worst thing you can do, youngster.  Believe me, I know, just 
like I know you’re thinkin’ to yourself that I’m full of shit, right about now.  Just like I 
know you’ll come around, with the right sort of help.” 
I started the door open, and let one foot fall onto the running board.  “Again, who 
says I need help.” 
“And again, I says.” 
“If I need it, what’s in it for you.” 
His grin broadened, and I saw hope shine in his eyes.  “Nothin’ much, really.  Not 
for me.  It’s my kid sister.  I hear she’s still alive, back in Dallas, though who knows for 
how long.  I was hopin’ you’d stop by to see her for me, maybe give her somethin’ I 
saved special for her, so she’d know I was alive and well all these years.  Before it got to 
be too late, and all.” 
“What sort of help would it be.”  Standing on the curb now, I slammed the door 
shut, and leaned through the open window to catch his answer. 
“The sort of help only our fine Town Store can provide.  When it’s time.” 
He waved me off with a flick of his spotted, bony hand, and gunned the Ford 
down the street.  Cackling madly. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
193 

 

O 

Or Reviled 

The smallest detail may kill.  A bit of tape left where it should have been 
removed, and a jumbo jet crashes into the sea.  A few vital welds left out of the 
implementation, and a hundred floor skyscraper totters sickly.  A single unforeseen turn 
of the wind, and a gorge-spanning suspension bridge twists itself to death.  Every walk to 
the gallows begins with a single step.  Whether it is the first step out of a death-row cell, 
or the first step of all, it must start somewhere, and all must hinge on the various details 
that make up each inch of the way.  This direction or that.  Stop or go.  It is the 
dichotomy of the minute.  Simple, single choices that may burn down a world.  Reflexive 
or intentional thoughts that shape individual movements, which movements compounded 
become the symphony of time, the compilations of history, which is nothing if it is not 
comprised of its many notes. 
Chance governs certainty.  The unknown bounds the known.  The best plans are 
defined by their countless potential failures, foreseen and unforeseen.  It is the nature of 
these failures that determines success.  Failures that may be negligible and benign.  Or 
wholesale and catastrophic.  At the end of it all, when the course of destiny can be said to 

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have run its full course, we, those of us that remain as witness, must decide which was 
the way of it.  For good or ill.  For better or worse. 
As we are naught but interpretation and relativism.  It is, therefore, our own minds 
that decide the start, and our own minds that determine the meaning of the end. 
When weighed so, all of life from birth to death seems a discreet collection of 
isolated events that, combined, add up to the whole of the individual.  When weighed so, 
it seems but grains of dust, that, gathered, slip through the fingers in cascades, leaving but 
meager portions behind as evidence of the entirety. 
So are we judged en-toto by these evident examples of our behaviors.  We are not 
every step of the way.  We are not every fine detail.  We are not all justification and 
comprehension.  We are, rather, a summary of ourselves.  We are the few painful details 
that seem relevant.  We are known by random grains of our presence that come up 
without direction or order, but are cast before the eyes that would see us, randomly with 
each scoop that would measure. 
Reach in to discern the character of this person or that, and come up each time 
with a different handful of bits and pieces.  See them on a bad day, and they are bad.  On 
a good day, and they are good.  Remember them for the facade they would put forth, and 
that you would inevitably seen through. Somehow manage to label them, each and every 
one.  For they must be cataloged in memory after some fashion.  They must be recalled in 
some way when the time comes.  So let all be known by the few steps that are, as a flash 
print, seen by the few that would witness. 

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Stephen Huff 
195 
From these individual stop-motion images, let all be judged.  Let all be put forth 
before the world in a glaring light to be examined in detail for the detail that could never 
be apparent in so slight a slice of time. 
Let a man do great things all his life long, then peg him for the dips of his demeanor, the 
flaws of his character.  When he stumbles at the end, remember him for a bumbling fool, rather 
than the hero he might have been. 
This is easier.  As it is the big, obvious, undeniable bits of evidence that come 
immediately to hand. 
Build something beautiful, and be celebrity for a night.  Smash this same something, and 
be reviled for eternity.  Save someone’s life and be remembered for a day.  Kill someone, and be 
remembered for all of recorded time. 
As the gaunt old man had said, a kind of redemption may be found in murder.  Especially 
when it is exceptionally bizarre or bloody or prolific, or all three at once.  Let it be photos of 
schoolchildren lying slaughtered alongside toppled bicycles on a Saturday afternoon, and print it 
repeatedly, incessantly, and obsessively.  Let it be videos of bullets punching through walls and 
ceilings and bodies, and play it for decades in high definition color.  Let it be interviews of 
blooded, battered survivors, their voices trembling and shocked and sickened, and it will be 
heard by countless generations of gluttonously starving ears. 
For we are a herd that would stand in a cool circle about the feeding pack that has, in a 
frenzy, made a fresh kill of one of our own.  Munching our fodder, we stand watching with dully 
glazed eyes, uninterrupted save for the occasional consideration of our own vain fortune. 
Yet it is coming to us all, eventually.  Obviously.  Inevitably. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
196 
How will it be, I wonder sometimes, to be at the center of that bloody circle, looking out 
at them that would watch helplessly or disinterestedly.  How will it be to come to that last step, 
to make that final mark on the world.  Will it be so easy to remain impartial and aloof and pass 
the time uninterrupted. 
I think not.  It will be a time of screaming and of crying out.  It will be a time of reaching, 
of reaching for mercy, salvation or understanding that can never come. 
Still, however bloody and painful, however slight and unnoticeable, however immediate 
or distant, it must be rendered to the fine granularity of but another singular detail when it is 
finished.  A detail that may be the missing weld, or the weld that saved all.  A detail that may be 
a bit of tape left unintentionally where it should have been removed, and by its innocent presence 
murdered two hundred and fifty men, women and children. 
Or it may be a man, a potentially great man, capable of great things, who one day met a 
bad woman and loved her, and who one day later would do a very bad thing in the name of that 
love.  Who was remembered for it forever.  Or reviled. 
She was beautiful.  Smart.  Well bred.  Wealthy. 
I credit her with everything I would become, and I blame her for it, too.  Looking back on 
it from the vantage of the far away ends of it all, I can clearly see how I must have been nothing 
more than an interesting plaything for her.  How I must have bored her, eventually. 
For I was not of her stock.  I was not cut from the same quality material. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
197 
When I was on screen or on the field, I was something to polish and shine and boast, and 
when I was not... I was a dark, dirty secret to be kept in the strictest confidence and overlooked 
during the course of polite party conversation. 
Oh, I didn’t see any of this in the beginning.  In the beginning, I genuinely believed that 
she loved me.  Love.  I’m laughing now, though you can’t hear it.  It’s a great joke, you see, to 
write the words ‘love’ and ‘she’ in the same sentence, while referring to that angel of darkness.  
For it was an alien concept to her, I learned eventually.  It was a useful abstraction to be used on 
the ignorant, but it was not her practice or something she enjoyed. 
If you have ever seen a cat batting its living prey from one injury to the next, then you 
have seen her eyes, and all of love that could ever shine within them.  I have seen her that way, 
when she believed herself to be unobserved and alone.  I have seen her examine my fate with the 
sadistic curiosity of a predator that would grow bored with its meal before devouring it.  If it was 
love, then it was a love of the possession of a thing, which possession implied the power to 
destroy that thing.  At any time.  For any reason, however whimsical. 
Gazing into her cold emerald eyes, I often had the distinct impression that I was a curious 
glass bauble in her grip.  A thing that, for the moment, attracted her attention and distracted her 
baser character.  A thing that, should its luster fade, could be so easily discarded to shatter with a 
careless toss over her neglectful shoulder. 
Yet, it was the nature of her attention that I could not deny her, for it was intense and 
focused while it remained.  I would learn eventually how she was obsessive with her 
possessions, all of them, and how her desire to own what she would covet was matched only by 

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Stephen Huff 
198 
her jealous keep of it, once she laid her hands upon it.  I could not possibly fathom the depths of 
her desires, or discern so much as a single detail of her vast, corrupt intrigues, for they were 
beyond me, but it was immediately and painfully obvious that she would have what she wanted, 
regardless of cost or consequence.  As she would have me. 
It seemed from my vantage point at the time that this was all coincidence and fortunate 
circumstance, our meeting that night.  Though it was anything but.  Such were the intricacies of 
her designs, that she should pick me from a lineup of All-Americans, place her finger upon my 
young, naive face, and say ‘I want that one’ from her circle of power fifteen hundred miles away.  
Then, somehow, contrive to own me. 
I wish I could say I was a struggle, a tough deal, a hard bargain.  I wish I could say that I 
was a tactical challenge, for saying so truthfully might justify me, in a fashion. 
After all, I did what I did because if it.  Because of her.  Because of a dreadful lack of 
her.  So I wish I could say that I struggled against her manipulations of me, that I was not a 
participant in her malformations of my soul, but I cannot.  I must confess that I longed to be her 
equal, and settled for my role as her well heeled lap dog.  I must reveal that I immediately 
proffered my wrists and ankles for keep in her chains, and I was happily bound.  I was her 
willing slave. 
You must understand that I felt I had arrived in her.  For years, she had been my 
destination.  Oh, not by name or face, but by ideal.  She was the very thing that I had positioned 
myself to attract and obtain.  She was a high step up the social ladder, higher than I ever dreamed 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
199 
I might take, for all my insatiable ambition.  She was a key to a vast vault of wealth and power, 
all wrapped up in a pleasing package.  Or so I thought. 
 A blind man may see many things with his eyes closed.  A fool may know most 
everything, and never ask a question.  When I first saw her, she was a young, naive sophomore, 
and seemed awestruck by me.  I humored her patiently through the small talk of the party, as it 
was early.  I can see now, looking back with the added vantage of age’s wisdom, how every 
word, every action, every incident was but a part of her carefully staged encounter with me.  
Though, at the time, I saw only her shapely curves.  I heard only her words about her parent’s 
great wealth, and her own healthy endowments. 
I saw her Porsche.  Her jewelry.  Her fine clothes.  I breathed her expensive perfume.  I 
touched her lovely hair. 
I followed her into the darkness, away from the party, where we could be alone.  As a 
spider that would feed in solitude, I can see now how she prepared me, every inch.  How it was 
no more than a final detail, in the end, to sink her fangs into me and render me stiff, her 
unwitting prey.  How she would devour me slowly through the years, a parasite to sip the life 
from me drop by drop, and to leave me a shriveled shell among the many such examples of her 
conquests that cluttered her foul web.  While I suffered unaware.  The pain of it was an exquisite 
pleasure, and would come to be an irresistible addiction.  Her form of murder came with a heady 
anesthetic.  I hardly felt it.  Scarcely saw it.  Never realized it was coming until it had come.  
Until it was far, far too late. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
200 
We flew to her parent’s home the next day.  It was the coupe-de-grace.  An immediate 
knock-out right to follow the previous nights’ unexpected left. 
By the early evening, I was staring out the window of her father’s limousine at the most 
incredible house I had ever seen.  I had heard that people lived this way, but I never really 
validated it as fact before that moment.  It was two miles up the drive to the main residence, 
which was a towering colonial affair that reeked of money.  I saw stables.  Tennis courts.  
Swimming pools.  Gardens shaped as mazes.  Endless miles of manicured green lawns, and a 
fortune in the finest automobiles parked in the circular drive out front and in the many garages 
around to the side of the main gate. 
She had said they were having a party.  When I heard that word, I thought of kegs and 
charcoal broiled hamburgers.  Where she lived, however, the word had an entirely different 
meaning.  She made me wear a tuxedo, which was, strangely, perfectly fit for me, as if it had 
been waiting in that closet for years.  I didn’t ask.  I dressed. 
I went downstairs when she said I should, trying to dry my palms in the deep, warm 
pockets of my penguin pants.  As the hours passed, I was introduced to senators and super 
models, movie stars and television heart throbs.  I spent half an hour with a guy I found to be 
vaguely amusing, only to learn he was a pop super-star, whom I had once seen in concert as a 
drunken teenager. 
I huddled and ducked my way through it, a boy that has been tossed onto a battlefield 
without warning, preparation or training.  She glided through it with the grace and elegance of a 
long practiced princess, and was mildly amused by my red face and profuse sweating. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
201 
Sometime near midnight, she slipped into the crook of my awkward right arm, and 
whispered something nastily delicious into my ear.  Then, much to my disappointment, she led 
me deep into the party crowd, rather than away from it as her tawdry whispers had implied.  
With a formal sort of introduction that was pointed and all but demanded that we converse, she 
presented me to a man I will not name. 
I will say that he was the star quarterback for a leading professional football team.   After 
introductions, she took his date to fetch us drinks, that we might be alone to discuss manly 
matters. 
We sized each other over the rims of our wilting cocktails.  He looked at me with the 
eyes of a sage veteran, which glazed momentarily with nostalgia.  While I watched him with the 
eyes of a junior leaguer that longed for the majors.  He had made it to a place I could only hope 
to see.  I envied him. 
I wouldn’t have believed it at the time, you understand, but now that it’s all wound down, 
I happen to know for a fact that he envied me, too.  Not for anything I had done or might do, but 
simply for my youth.  As all battered pros at the end of the road, he must have envied me the 
ease of my young, resilient frame.  He must have envied the painless fluidity with which my 
joints worked. 
I can be certain, because I envy those things myself today, when I see them.  Still, I 
wouldn’t have believed it at the time.  Playing for the pros was the Holy Grail.  He had touched 
God, and was changed for it. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
202 
He might have sensed something in me, too, for he took me aside that evening to speak 
briefly, earnestly to me.  The intensity of it was strange to me, and somewhat disturbing.  Later, I 
would realize it was all a part of her manipulations, but another bend of a single facet of the 
multi-faceted thing that she would one day fashion into me. 
He said, “So, kid, you play for Texas.” 
“Yeah.” 
“What are your numbers.” 
I shrugged and tried to act cool.  “I do alright.” 
“All American, I bet.  She wouldn’t be seen with anything less.  You’re not bullshitting 
anybody.” 
My eyes went wide, I remember.  “Excuse me.” 
“You, kid.  You’re so full of shit, you’re eyes are brown.”  He laughed, sipped from his 
drink, and cordially wrapped his big, long arm about my shoulders to lead me aside, as I have 
mentioned.  “Look at you!  If you could see your own face. 
“I’ve been watching you, son.  You look like a fish out of water.  No, worse, you look 
like somebody that was handed a bowl of chocolate pudding, only to find out at the first spoonful 
it was cold dogshit, instead.”  He laughed, and we leaned against individual walls in a quiet 
corner of the large ballroom, where the party stirred its mysterious human currents. 
“I saw you come in.  Driven in her daddy’s car.  Wearing her clothes, too, I bet.  Right.” 
I swallowed and was ashamed.  “I’m not trying to bullshit anybody, mister.  I was 
invited.  I came.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
203 
“I’ll bet you did.  Hey, you don’t have to worry about me, kid.  We’re the same, you and 
I.  Although, I think I handled it a bit better than you are.  Get a grip.  You’re flushed.  You look 
like you just ran the 100 meter dash.” 
“I wish I was on the field.  Anywhere but here.” 
“Hey, don’t say that.  This is where you’ll get to live after the field, if you’re lucky.  This 
is what it’s all about.  See that guy over there.”  He sipped from his drink, and pointed casually 
with his extended pinky, a move I found to be most smooth indeed.  The style of it was learned 
and practiced, artful.  “I spent an hour with him over by the pool earlier tonight.  You know who 
he is.” 
I shook my head.  The other shrugged.  “Just as well, the details are irrelevant.  Still, I 
struck up a side-deal with him for the cost of a few off-color jokes and chuckles.  It’ll net me ten 
million, maybe, if I play it right.  If not.”  He rolled his eyes.  “Who cares.  A half-dozen other 
guys will hit me up tonight with something else.  I couldn’t make all the money they offer if 
there were ten of me. 
“Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not stupid.  I know it can’t last.  I might have another good 
year left in me, if I’m lucky.  Another championship year, I mean.  After that, it’s a downhill 
slide.  My wife.  How long do you think it will last, after they stop using my name on-air.  I’m 
taking odds, and the break-even is twelve months.  You get ten to one on three years.”  He was 
sardonic, and sipped his empty drink with a slurping sound. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
204 
“I don’t give a fuck.  She’s a stuck-up bitch, anyway.  Her and this whole crowd... not an 
ounce of substance among them.  So what.  Substance won’t build you a nice house like this 
one.  Human decency won’t save you from the grim reaper.” 
“I guess.” 
“You know what I’m going to do, kid.” 
“What.” he didn’t seem to require the prompt, but I humored him. 
“Whatever the fuck I want to do,” he spat viciously.   “When all is said and finished and 
all this... bullshit is past me, when they put me out to pasture and forget about me altogether, I’m 
going to go fishing and I’m never coming back.”  I wondered if he was drunk.  He emptied his 
latest round with a particular vehemence, and sought his woman out in the crowd with the half-
crazed eyes of a man condemned and unable to escape from his fate.  He found her in the center 
of a ring of young men, all laughing and joking in a way that might catch her fancy and lead her 
to bed.  “It wasn’t like this when I started out, of course.  No, I was more like you, then.  Eager 
to get it all started, anxious to drive it on to its unknown end. 
“I thought it would last forever, I guess.  Maybe I wanted it to last forever, and it might 
have, had my resolve not flagged.  Except, it has.”  Sighing leadenly, he set his drink atop a tray, 
which was offered by a uniformed liveryman, and accepted yet another in return.  “I’m big 
enough to admit it, now, I guess.  It was inevitable.  Everybody gets old, and our sort of business 
is unforgiving of a man’s age.  Once, I could take the hits.  Once, I think I enjoyed the pain, but 
only for the contrast it provided from the absolute painlessness of youth.  Now, it’s all pain.  

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
205 
Every day.  I ache in every bone, every joint, every fiber, sometimes.  It makes me fear the 
future, because I can only guess how it will be in ten years.  Twenty. 
“I’ll be alone, you know.”  He was definitely drunk, I decided, getting drunker.  “I’ll be 
the first to admit that I’m generally an insufferable ass.  It goes with the fame and fortune, I 
suppose.  They build you up that way.  It’s good for publicity.  It’s good for the team.  Elitism 
sells, because everybody wants to be elite in some way, after some fashion.  For awhile, 
everybody wanted to be me. 
“Not any more, though.  This is my last year.  Did you know.  Did they announce it yet.”  
Rambling now, he appeared to forget about me for a moment, as his mind wandered freely.  “No, 
not yet.  At the end of the season.  Another month or two.  That’s it.” 
He shook his head to clear it, and sipped from his highball, the ice tinkling musically 
within his glass.  “It’s like a drug.  I want to save the last little bit of it, stretch it out as far as 
possible to the end.  Still, there’s only so much left.  It can’t last.  Not even for you, my friend.” 
I glowered at him and was ashamed for him.  Why had she deposited me here.  At the 
time, I could not see, because I could not empathize with the sodden has-been standing before 
me.  This was the nature of her ways.  It was all so far above me, that I wouldn’t see it in a true 
light for many years to come.  I didn’t know then that I would later review that meeting in my 
mind again and again, each time realizing how he was I and I was he, separated by the grace of a 
few years only. 
“I’m not in it for any particular reason,” I returned stiffly, “Other than paying my 
tuition.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
206 
“Right,” he growled, which growl turned to a sputtering laughter.  “Right, Mr. All-
American.  A bigger pile of shit I have never seen shoveled, boy.  Even if you really believe it, 
which you don’t, a man doesn’t rack up your kind of numbers except that he is driven by great 
need and ambition.  No,” he shook his head, slapping me playfully, if somewhat painfully, on the 
back, “The pros will come calling, and, when they do, you’ll be right there to take your cut.  
Hell, it’s probably already arranged somewhere, nice and neat.  Like you and that girl.  Some 
pair, huh.” 
I turned to find her in the crowd, much as he had for his earlier.  They were standing 
together at the center of that same ring of admirers, now.  She waved, and smiled.  I didn’t see 
the devil in it.  I couldn’t see the devil in it.  Yet it was there, in her lips, in her eyes, in the 
expression of her beautiful face.  Enticing.  Undeniable. 
“Yeah, she’s something special, alright.”  I waved back. 
He laughed long and blackly.  Too long, I thought.  When I remember it now, I can 
clearly understand why, though it was an enigma to me then. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
207 
Such is the nature of a serpent that it must lay in wait, invisible to the naked eye 
of its intended prey.  Such is the nature of the devil that it is often revealed as the 
presence of a beautiful woman before a man.  Such is the nature of a man, that he may be 
blinded to the truth by a visually pleasing facade of lies, which falsity deceives none but 
the most genuinely enthralled.  All can clearly see the danger, save for the victim poised 
on its irrevocable verge. 

 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
208 

 

P 

Palaces to Rule Them From 

I sat on the porch through the afternoon.  Thinking about my past.  Listening to 
the uncountable voices that spoke within my own mind.  Reliving the glory of my youth, 
and the sad state of its disintegration. 
Just as I noted the lengthening shadows that indicate a sunset, though the sun 
remained, as ever, unseen for the dense forest canopy, they came to me.  Two men in 
dark suits, wearing dark glasses.  They seemed stereotypical of themselves, something 
out of a low budget movie. 
Between thoughts, they appeared at the curb just where the walk to the house 
terminated at the street. I hadn’t heard or seen them approach.  I couldn’t guess how they 
had come.  I glanced up, and they were there.  Standing together without speaking, 
without moving, their faces and expressionless gazes fixed resolutely on me. 
For a time that seemed an eternity, the tableau remained fixed.  No one moved, no 
one spoke.  Until I decided that they had found me at last, and started forward to run. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
209 
“Don’t,” whispered a voice at my back.  “And don’t turn around.”  It was her, 
speaking to me from the darkness beyond the open window at my back.  “You won’t get 
away and it will only make it worse.” 
“Who are they.”  Then she was gone, and the only answer I received was the 
sound of their wingtips on the sidewalk, as they approached. 
“Johnny.  Johnny Bullet.” one of them asked coolly. 
I said nothing.  I did nothing, save to wonder if I should listen to her.  By the time 
I had decided, it was too late.  They were standing on the porch, their shadows cast over 
me as a cloak of darkness. 
“You are Johnny Bullet.”  It was a statement, not a question.  I swallowed, and 
wondered why there weren’t more of them. 
The other one, the man on the left, who remained standing on the top step leading 
to the porch, offered, “We just want to talk, Johnny.  If you have a minute to spare.” 
I wanted to laugh.  I thought I heard the old crow cackling somewhere across 
town.  Yet I remained silent. 
“We have a... proposition for you.” 
“Something that would interest you, we hope.” 
Finally, I returned, “Nothing interests me, any more.  Fuck off.” 
Their expressions did not change.  “Nevertheless, we must speak with you.” 
“So talk.” 
They exchanged glances, and eased closer.  The one on the porch moved to stand 
next to my chair, while the other on the steps moved to stand before the open front door 
of the house. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
210 
“Not here.  You must come with us.” 
“I’m not going anywhere,” I spat, craning my neck to stare up at his impassive 
face.  I could see straight up his hairy nostrils from this vantage.  “It’s going to be dark, 
soon, and I don’t like the nightlife of this place.” 
“You will be safe before darkfall.  We insist.” 
I sighed. “You know,” I offered glibly, “I’ve only been here a couple of days, but I’m 
already pretty confident that I don’t like anybody here.” 
The first one stood firm.  “We’re not from around here.” 
“That surprises me.  I mean, you blend so well.” 
“Come with us, please.” 
“I said, no, damn it!”  He reached for me, and I shrugged him off. 
Instantly, he was at my throat.  The other one slammed the front door of the house, and 
leapt on my legs, as we were toppling to sprawl across the porch.  I spilled out of the chair and 
twisted out of the first one’s grasp, delivering a savage kick directly to the point of his nose.  His 
glasses came apart.  I saw his eyes for the first time. 
They were ice blue and they burned with a strangely sterile sort of light.  When he looked 
at me, I knew he was forecasting my death, but it was not a malevolent consideration.  I found no 
personal animosity there.  Instead, it was the cold, clinical regard of a scientist for a helpless lab 
animal.  He would dissect me carefully, as required by his mysterious purposes, his eyes told me, 
and my suffering would be... irrelevant. 
I scrambled backward like a crab, seeking my feet.  My back came up hard against the 
porch rail at the side of the house, and I went through it.  Tumbling backward heels over head, I 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
211 
at last managed to get my feet underneath me.  Thinking it had been a double mistake to listen to 
that damnable woman, double because I knew better than to trust her, I turned, and I ran. 
Immediately, I heard their footsteps at my back.  I ran around the house.  As I turned the 
corner, I glanced back to judge my lead.  It was non existent.  The one with the broken glasses 
was reaching for me.  The stop-action motion of his stretch played out frame upon frame at the 
backs of my eyes.  His fingers, incredibly long and powerful, sought for me from the end of an 
unbelievably long arm. Laid out like a thoroughbred bound for the tape, his right hand slipped 
along the wrinkled flap of my shirt tail, but fell short by an infinitesimal degree. 
At which point I caught my surprised breath, and let my legs fly free.  We charged 
through the dilapidated courtyard at breakneck speed, scattering the flimsy tables and chairs in 
every direction with the fury of the chase. 
When I next glanced back, I was startled to see two enormous black dogs collared with 
iron there, loping along at my heels.  Their confident, full-length stride spoke assuredly of their 
success in this matter, and I was shocked into a stumble. 
My knees came up hard against my chest, as I felt myself collapsing to the ground.  By 
grace of sheer instinct and long practice at keeping my feet in a crush, I pulled it out, and sprang 
across the back alley, between two shabby frame structures and out into the next street over. 
The hounds stood to my waist at their shoulders, and one each came around to either side 
of me almost immediately, accelerating effortlessly beyond me by half a length to demonstrate 
the futility of my escape.  They neither snarled nor snapped, and their huge, thick, pink tongues 
bounced loosely from one side of their gaping maws, which bristled with savage fangs. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
212 
I slowed to a trot, then a walk, and let myself come to a stop.  It had been a short, fierce 
run.  If the dogs weren’t winded, I was.  I bent over, my hands on my knees, sucking air. 
“It’s a short walk.”  Grey suit was standing there when I next glanced up, of course, and 
the enormous dogs were gone.  His partner lingered to one side, starched and stiff, unflustered 
from the chase.  “You will follow us.” 
Gasping, I nodded, and followed when he started walking.  The other one assumed his 
place just behind me, ready to reach for me should I try to escape.  I wondered where we were 
going, but only briefly. 
Briefly, because I could not begin to guess.  As the shadows continued their descending 
growth, the forest, as always, began to stir.  Far away yet somehow all too near, I could hear the 
brays and hoots and catcalls of an awakening nocturnal host.  Quivers of primordial wariness 
chased along the course of my spine and would not be stilled, no matter how I fought to change 
the focus of my thoughts. 
The two goons walking before and behind me didn’t ease my concern.  From time to 
time, as I caught them indirectly with the uncertain edge of my vision, they seemed the enormous 
black dogs I had earlier mistaken them for, all long, pink, lolling tongues and dripping fang, their 
fierce eyes shining with a blood-thirsty malevolence.  Yet, when I turned to check the reason of 
my vision, they remained men.  Well groomed, well dressed, official sort of men.  I refused to 
question my sanity. 
It was the weird, falling light.  It was the disturbing sounds of the forest.  It was the rising 
mystery of the night.  All conspiring with my own fickle mind to confuse me. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
213 
They led me across the street, between the two buildings, back across the alley and 
through the courtyard, until we were delivered at the front of the hotel once more.  A long, black 
limousine waited at the curb.  It was ancient, if immaculately shined and preserved.  I guessed it 
was manufactured in the nineteen-sixties. 
The suit at my back shoved me across the lawn, in the direction of the car.  I must have 
hesitated at the sight of it, though it was not a conscious action.  The windows of it were blackly 
tinted and impenetrable.  Anyone and anything might be lurking within, I thought, but I was 
pretty certain that, whoever it was, it wasn’t the government.  It wasn’t law enforcement. 
With a metallic thump that spoke of well engineered components, the rear passenger door 
of the limo popped open.  The first suit pulled it wide, and stood to one side, indicating I should 
climb inside.  His eyes blazed like white diamonds caught in the sun.  His expression brooked no 
discussion. 
Shrugging, I surrendered myself to my fate, and climbed inside.  Nothing and no one 
could have prepared me for the meeting that followed. 
Let me simply say that there are two kinds of truth.  The first sort comes from what we 
know secondhand.   The second sort comes from what we know from our own very real personal 
experiences.  Neither sort is fully trustworthy.  Much of it is guesswork and outright lies.  They 
lie to us, whoever ‘they’ might be at the moment.  We lie to ourselves.  In fact, only fools are not 
hard pressed to determine where the lies end and the truth begins. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
214 
The man sitting on the far side of that rear seat was both.  A truth.  A lie.  His was a face I 
knew well.  When I saw it, everything fell into place.  The beginning.  The middle.  The end.  
Her, too. 
“You’re dead,” I stated simply, my eyes wide.  Long accustomed to shock, I was 
nonetheless surprised.  Stunned.  An electric vibration hummed within the core of my being. 
He laughed.  His teeth were crooked and yellow, evidence of his old world attitude that 
cared nothing for self-preservation.  In fact, he was puffing a large cigar and sipping from a glass 
of cognac at the moment. 
“I suppose we all are, in a certain sense of the word.”  He tipped his balding head toward 
a wet bar that was opened opposite our seat.  “Drink.”  His drooping jowls jiggled with the 
motion of it. 
The door at my elbow slammed shut.  The limo started off at once.  I couldn’t see the 
driver for the visor raised between us.  I could scarcely see through the windows for the tint.  I 
knew nobody could see inside. 
“It’s good to see you again, John,” he offered glibly.  His face was smeared with a 
sardonic humor, a goading gloat.  “We worried.” 
“We.” 
“Those of us that care, John.  Those of us that know you for what you truly are.” 
“Like the child molester you sent along to find me.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
215 
He smiled, and tipped his head toward the bar again.  I accepted, and leaned across my 
knees to slide onto a padded bench that framed the tiny serving table.  Filling a crystal tumbler 
with cubes and Southern Comfort, I returned to the bench to sit opposite him. 
“You look well, for a dead man,” I offered eventually, when the liquor had burned a 
measure of resolve into my gut. 
“I might say the same to you.” 
I ignored the implications of his statement.  “What do you want from me.” 
“Same as always, John.  We want you to play.” 
“Play what.  I’m too old for the game, and you know it.” 
His reply was a deep, throaty chuckle that smacked of avarice and self-indulgence.  
“There are games, John, and then there are games.” 
Sizing me with his steady gaze, he sipped and smoked and was silent for a time.  Behind 
him, the town scrolled past the limo’s windshields.  We rounded that same tired stop sign, and 
headed toward the city limits. 
As we passed the Town Store, I saw the old woman, Bonnie, standing on her porch, one 
hand on her ample hip, the other shading her squinted gaze.  With an owl’s liquid neck, she 
watched us pass.  We drove on without slowing. 
“John,” he sighed, “For a smart kid, you’re one dumb son of a bitch.  You know that.”  
He laughed and sipped from his drink, and then his cigar, his jowls jiggling with the movements 
of it.  His eyes were mocking.  “Hot damn, but I could never figure you.  Of them all, you were 
the greatest... question.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
216 
“Never great enough.” 
Returning a shrug, he turned to watch the greenery scroll past his window.  I stared at the 
balding pate of the back of his head.  “Nobody is EVER great enough, John.  Genghis Kahn, 
Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon, Adolph Hitler, his best friend and lover, Joseph Stalin,” laughing 
again he nodded out the window at Bonnie.  “Bitches like that, there.  Nobody lives forever.   
Nobody rules forever.” 
“Not even you.” 
“Not even me, kid, right.”  He finished his cognac, and set the glass into a holder in the 
armrest of the door at his elbow.  “Especially not me, John.  You know, you get there and you 
got it, and it’s only then that you realize there’s a whole world of people lined up behind you, 
elbowing and pushing and shoving and, sometimes, killing to get where you are.  You get this 
sinking feeling in your gut... I did anyway... because you know that the next stop after arrival is 
yet another departure.  Once you get it, John, whatever it is, the next thing to come is losing it.  
You’ll drop it in boredom or someone else will come along and take it away from you.  If it, 
whatever it is, has any value at all, I mean.” 
I smiled.  “Like they scrambled to fill your seat, as soon as it was emptied.” 
“Exactly.  Did you know, John, they had a party - a fucking PARTY, John - afterwards.  
Did you know they toasted my absence all night long.” 
It was my turn to shrug and finish my drink with a long gulp.  “Some of them are 
drinking in your name to this day, I’m sure.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
217 
His glance at me was sharp and immediate.  It was the look of a man that has found his 
dog in the trash.  It asked if I knew where I stood.  It wondered if I realized the leash was 
collared about my neck, and held in his hand, rather than the other way about.  My return was 
defiance.  I didn’t care.  I couldn’t care.  What more could he and his kind do to me, my own 
eyes asked.  What worse was there. 
He shook his head and his loose jowls danced.  His face was deadly and serious, and he 
sucked on his cigar with an enigmatic resolve.  “One dumb son of a bitch,” he breathed, exhaling 
a plume of smoke.  “I could never figure you.  Every time I thought I had you pegged, you’d go 
off and do something I couldn’t understand.  Like a madman in command of an army, there 
seemed to be no method to your tactics or strategies, yet you always seemed to... arrive just 
where you thought you should be.  On field or off.” 
I slid across the way to fill my glass once more.  It was good whiskey, and I saw no 
reason to abstain.  He offered his own tumbler.  He didn’t have to say, I knew what he liked, so I 
made it for him. 
“I learned young,” I replied eventually, reveling in the heady smell of the fine cognac that 
I was pouring into his crystal glass, “To get what I want with my mind.” 
“That business at the end...” he hinted, shaking his head with disapproval.  “It was brutal 
and senseless.” 
I stared at him hard and long while I drained my second glass, and I immediately poured 
another, before returning his own cup and sliding back into my seat opposite him.  “That’s your 
opinion.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
218 
“Why.”  He asked the ultimate question. 
I shrugged and stared out the heavily tinted window at his back.  I thought we might cross 
the bridge, as I saw it looming on the near horizon before us now, but, no, the driver slowed and 
turned left onto a side road.  He smiled to see the slight dismay that must have shown on my 
face, but said nothing at all about it. 
“Why what.”  I returned dully, feigning ignorance. 
“Why did you do it.” 
“Who says I did it.  Besides everybody, I mean.” 
He was still shaking his head, and didn’t stop to sip from his freshened drink.  “Every 
time I thought I had you pegged... and so I’ve decided, John, that you are one of two things.  You 
are either the dumbest and, at the same time, the luckiest bastard I have ever met...” 
“Or.” I prompted after a long moment had passed in silence.  I wasn’t here for the 
company, after all. 
“Or, you’re just plain nuts.” 
“Sometimes, I wonder myself.” 
“The worry of it, John, at least for me, is that a combination of unfathomable insanity and 
obvious genius is a dangerous mixture.  Like fuel and air.  Add the right amount of pressure, and 
you have ignition, don’t you.  Combustion.  A vast burning.  Great destruction.” 
“A man should go down in a blaze of glory, I guess.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
219 
“Glory.”  He laughed, “You’re crazier than I thought you might be, if you believe that!  
Glory, John.  Jesus-H-Christ on a crutch, boy, you had all of that a man could ever get on the 
field, didn’t you.  Wasn’t that enough.” 
“No.” 
“Afterward, your face sprayed across the nation, in fact, across the world, so you were an 
article to millions.  Wasn’t that enough.” 
“I guess not.” 
Waggling a finger at my face, his own face red and swollen with the consumption of 
alcohol, he brayed, “Now I think I have you, John!  Now I believe I see!  It was all about holding 
on, wasn’t it.  To the last little bit.  The final fingertip.  Was that it.” 
I glanced away, and thought of that same party so long ago, of the has-been hero and his 
maudlin rambling.  I thought how power was the ultimate drug, better than heroin or cocaine or 
even money, because, I knew from experience, if you had the power, everything else was 
incidental and could be had in its own time.  With power came the world, and with enough 
power driven by the proper ambition, the world could be owned. 
“You really pissed me off, you know.”  He growled petulantly. 
“Yeah, I know.” 
“I lost a lot of money.” 
“More than you won.”  My tone was sharp and accusatory.  He was whining.  Nobody 
likes a whiner. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
220 
“Not all at once, but more than I ever won in a single game.  Ten games put together, 
maybe.  We all had... a lot... riding on you that day.” 
“I was happy to let you down.” 
He chuckled deeply, darkly, a craven lunatic that had his hands about the very neck he 
had for so long lusted to strangle.  “You did more damage than you could ever know, boy.” 
“Really.”  I sipped from my drink coolly.  “Do you think, really.  More than I could ever 
know.  You’re not giving me much credit.” 
“Fucking egomaniac!” he spat.  “You were nothing!  Even at the top of your curve, you 
were nothing!  A fucking spec, that’s all!  A god damned Iowa farm boy, fresh from the fields!  
That’s all you ever were.” 
I felt my gaze flatten and darken.  “Fuck you, asshole.” 
We had come to stalemate.  We sat in silence and stared at each other for a time.  His 
eyes were sparkling pig’s eyes, that burned with a distant bon-fire blaze of lunacy and stark, 
naked malice.  He would murder me happily, I knew, with his own two hands, if he could 
manage it. 
I broke the silence with a roll of my eyes and a rise of my shoulders.  Turning my 
attention to my drink, I raised it to my lips, and said, around the flowing liquid, “I fixed you up 
just right, I thought.” 
He slapped the glass from my hand, so the whiskey in it sprayed across the passenger 
cabin of the limo.  I was surprised by the sudden violence of it, and started forward to punch him 
in the mouth. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
221 
At the same moment, however, the black visor that separated our compartment from the 
driver started down with the whine of an electric motor.  There, sitting in the passenger seat, was 
a big, black dock that wore a thick, iron collar and that shone it’s brilliant, diamond blue eyes 
upon me with much hunger and bloody desire. 
I eased back into my seat, even as the visor rose once more.  He smoothed his ruffled 
shirt and slacks, and sucked on his cigar.  Both our empty glasses lay on the floorboard, and 
washed back and forth with each bump, sway and turn of the car. 
“Yeah, I guess you did, at that.” 
“All from a spec.  A bastard farm boy from Iowa, and you, the fucking king of your 
world.” 
“Still, it wasn’t you that pushed the button.” 
“Wasn’t it.” 
That started him forward again, his palm open, but I think he realized almost immediately 
that not even his dogs would save him the next time he touched me that way.  I thought of 
shotguns and brains laid out on a gravel drive.  I thought of my stiffened fingers and his soft, 
fleshy throat. 
He feigned a nonchalant laugh.  “Oh, well, it was bound to happen sooner or later.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
222 
I was still angry, though, and pushed it a step further.  Always a step further. “Yet 
it came sooner, rather than later, don’t you agree.” 
“Prick.  You’ll get yours, too.  Don’t you see it.  Don’t you feel it.  That’s the 
way it is.  You get there, but you can’t stay.” 
“I haven’t come to that realization.” 
“You’re HERE, John!  How can you have anything.  Anything, at all.  It’s not 
even a matter of when, anymore.  It’s already HAPPENED!” 
“I have what’s inside my own head, old man.  That’s all anybody ever has.  I have 
the truth of it, every minute, every second, of it.” 
“You’re talking about peace of mind.  It can’t be enough.” 
“Maybe.  Maybe not.” 
“I don’t understand you at all, John.  Not one little bit.” 
“We come from two different planets, don’t we.  How could you understand.  To 
you, coming up the way you did in the lap of luxury, everything’s a game.  While to me, 
having had to fight for every little scrap, everything is a brutal, harsh reality.  While you 
were playing, I was working.” 
“Working hard, too, I suppose.” 
“Hard enough.  I learned that a man can do and become anything he wants to do 
or become, if he wants that thing enough.  You said I was a spec, well, I say you are a 
spec.  An insect.  A parasite.  You are a stupid, ignorant man, and your power could 
never belie that fact.  You are a shallow vessel, and no amount of gluttony could ever fill 
your emptiness.  You are a coarse, base animal, and no amount of refinement could cover 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
223 
your crassness.  Cunning is no substitute for genuine intelligence.  Guile is no stand-in 
for education. 
“You...” I sighed, remembering it all so wearily, “Were simply an ugly little man 
that would train his animals viciously, then send them out to spill blood viciously.  Were 
you really so surprised when one turned to bite you.” 
He paused, and seemed to genuinely consider the question.  “Yes.  I was terribly 
surprised.  You can’t imagine the shock of it.” 
I smiled.  “Thanks.  That was a compliment, I think.” 
“In a way.  In a way, it was the time of day.  It means nothing.  Nothing at all.” 
My smile broadened, “As I recall, it meant a great deal.  Let’s see,” I hedged, 
pretending to struggle to remember, though the pictures of it came as luridly and instantly 
to my thoughts as only the fondest memories could.  “You were eating dinner, weren’t 
you.  It was a dish with noodles.  You know why I remember that bit of it.  Because I 
couldn’t tell where the noodles ended and your guts began, from the pictures they printed 
in the paper.   They found your right arm across the street, didn’t they.” 
His face went pale and doughy.  He seemed to remember it all for himself, and it 
was his turn to look away. 
“I thought it must have been quick, at first, the explosion made such a mess of the 
place.  Then,” I added gleefully, “I read further, and learned that you lived for nearly a 
half hour, afterward.  You made it all the way to the hospital, before they declared you 
dead.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
224 
The moment that hung between us then was long and deep and black and leaden 
as the mass of a deep, brimming ocean.  “That was the best part of you, I thought.  Your 
end.   A blaze of glory.” 
“Fuck you!”  He rounded on me, “It’s not smart, you talking to me that way.  Not 
here.  Not in this place.” 
“What have I to fear from dead men.” 
“Perhaps from dead men you have the most to fear.  After all, everybody’s a dead 
man sooner or later, aren’t they.  There are several here, like me, that remember you for 
what you really are.  Or were.  Still, it wasn’t you that pushed the button, was it.  It had 
nothing to do with you.” 
“So what.  It happened somehow in the end.  That was good enough.” 
“Just as it will happen to you, some day.” 
“Some day,” I agreed simply. 
The car slowed, and spun hard right again, this time turning onto a narrow and 
obviously private drive.  We passed beneath an over-arching gate of scrolled ironwork.  
Words were made there that I could not read. 
“This your place.” I wondered aloud, hoping I sounded more careless about the 
situation than I felt.  As with the descent of night in the forest, this place chilled me.  I 
was certain it was nowhere I wanted to be. 
He chuckled and his eyes blazed maliciously.  “There are kingdoms, John, even in 
hell, with kings to rule them, and palaces to rule them from.” 
His chuckle turned to unbound laughter, hilarity.  Soon enough, I would learn 
why. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
225 

 

P 

Palaces to Rule Them From 

I sat on the porch through the afternoon.  Thinking about my past.  Listening to 
the uncountable voices that spoke within my own mind.  Reliving the glory of my youth, 
and the sad state of its disintegration. 
Just as I noted the lengthening shadows that indicate a sunset, though the sun 
remained, as ever, unseen for the dense forest canopy, they came to me.  Two men in 
dark suits, wearing dark glasses.  They seemed stereotypical of themselves, something 
out of a low budget movie. 
Between thoughts, they appeared at the curb just where the walk to the house 
terminated at the street. I hadn’t heard or seen them approach.  I couldn’t guess how they 
had come.  I glanced up, and they were there.  Standing together without speaking, 
without moving, their faces and expressionless gazes fixed resolutely on me. 
For a time that seemed an eternity, the tableau remained fixed.  No one moved, no 
one spoke.  Until I decided that they had found me at last, and started forward to run. 

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226 
“Don’t,” whispered a voice at my back.  “And don’t turn around.”  It was her, 
speaking to me from the darkness beyond the open window at my back.  “You won’t get 
away and it will only make it worse.” 
“Who are they.”  Then she was gone, and the only answer I received was the 
sound of their wingtips on the sidewalk, as they approached. 
“Johnny.  Johnny Bullet.” one of them asked coolly. 
I said nothing.  I did nothing, save to wonder if I should listen to her.  By the time 
I had decided, it was too late.  They were standing on the porch, their shadows cast over 
me as a cloak of darkness. 
“You are Johnny Bullet.”  It was a statement, not a question.  I swallowed, and 
wondered why there weren’t more of them. 
The other one, the man on the left, who remained standing on the top step leading 
to the porch, offered, “We just want to talk, Johnny.  If you have a minute to spare.” 
I wanted to laugh.  I thought I heard the old crow cackling somewhere across 
town.  Yet I remained silent. 
“We have a... proposition for you.” 
“Something that would interest you, we hope.” 
Finally, I returned, “Nothing interests me, any more.  Fuck off.” 
Their expressions did not change.  “Nevertheless, we must speak with you.” 
“So talk.” 
They exchanged glances, and eased closer.  The one on the porch moved to stand 
next to my chair, while the other on the steps moved to stand before the open front door 
of the house. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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227 
“Not here.  You must come with us.” 
“I’m not going anywhere,” I spat, craning my neck to stare up at his impassive 
face.  I could see straight up his hairy nostrils from this vantage.  “It’s going to be dark, 
soon, and I don’t like the nightlife of this place.” 
“You will be safe before darkfall.  We insist.” 
I sighed. “You know,” I offered glibly, “I’ve only been here a couple of days, but I’m 
already pretty confident that I don’t like anybody here.” 
The first one stood firm.  “We’re not from around here.” 
“That surprises me.  I mean, you blend so well.” 
“Come with us, please.” 
“I said, no, damn it!”  He reached for me, and I shrugged him off. 
Instantly, he was at my throat.  The other one slammed the front door of the house, and 
leapt on my legs, as we were toppling to sprawl across the porch.  I spilled out of the chair and 
twisted out of the first one’s grasp, delivering a savage kick directly to the point of his nose.  His 
glasses came apart.  I saw his eyes for the first time. 
They were ice blue and they burned with a strangely sterile sort of light.  When he looked 
at me, I knew he was forecasting my death, but it was not a malevolent consideration.  I found no 
personal animosity there.  Instead, it was the cold, clinical regard of a scientist for a helpless lab 
animal.  He would dissect me carefully, as required by his mysterious purposes, his eyes told me, 
and my suffering would be... irrelevant. 
I scrambled backward like a crab, seeking my feet.  My back came up hard against the 
porch rail at the side of the house, and I went through it.  Tumbling backward heels over head, I 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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228 
at last managed to get my feet underneath me.  Thinking it had been a double mistake to listen to 
that damnable woman, double because I knew better than to trust her, I turned, and I ran. 
Immediately, I heard their footsteps at my back.  I ran around the house.  As I turned the 
corner, I glanced back to judge my lead.  It was non existent.  The one with the broken glasses 
was reaching for me.  The stop-action motion of his stretch played out frame upon frame at the 
backs of my eyes.  His fingers, incredibly long and powerful, sought for me from the end of an 
unbelievably long arm. Laid out like a thoroughbred bound for the tape, his right hand slipped 
along the wrinkled flap of my shirt tail, but fell short by an infinitesimal degree. 
At which point I caught my surprised breath, and let my legs fly free.  We charged 
through the dilapidated courtyard at breakneck speed, scattering the flimsy tables and chairs in 
every direction with the fury of the chase. 
When I next glanced back, I was startled to see two enormous black dogs collared with 
iron there, loping along at my heels.  Their confident, full-length stride spoke assuredly of their 
success in this matter, and I was shocked into a stumble. 
My knees came up hard against my chest, as I felt myself collapsing to the ground.  By 
grace of sheer instinct and long practice at keeping my feet in a crush, I pulled it out, and sprang 
across the back alley, between two shabby frame structures and out into the next street over. 
The hounds stood to my waist at their shoulders, and one each came around to either side 
of me almost immediately, accelerating effortlessly beyond me by half a length to demonstrate 
the futility of my escape.  They neither snarled nor snapped, and their huge, thick, pink tongues 
bounced loosely from one side of their gaping maws, which bristled with savage fangs. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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229 
I slowed to a trot, then a walk, and let myself come to a stop.  It had been a short, fierce 
run.  If the dogs weren’t winded, I was.  I bent over, my hands on my knees, sucking air. 
“It’s a short walk.”  Grey suit was standing there when I next glanced up, of course, and 
the enormous dogs were gone.  His partner lingered to one side, starched and stiff, unflustered 
from the chase.  “You will follow us.” 
Gasping, I nodded, and followed when he started walking.  The other one assumed his 
place just behind me, ready to reach for me should I try to escape.  I wondered where we were 
going, but only briefly. 
Briefly, because I could not begin to guess.  As the shadows continued their descending 
growth, the forest, as always, began to stir.  Far away yet somehow all too near, I could hear the 
brays and hoots and catcalls of an awakening nocturnal host.  Quivers of primordial wariness 
chased along the course of my spine and would not be stilled, no matter how I fought to change 
the focus of my thoughts. 
The two goons walking before and behind me didn’t ease my concern.  From time to 
time, as I caught them indirectly with the uncertain edge of my vision, they seemed the enormous 
black dogs I had earlier mistaken them for, all long, pink, lolling tongues and dripping fang, their 
fierce eyes shining with a blood-thirsty malevolence.  Yet, when I turned to check the reason of 
my vision, they remained men.  Well groomed, well dressed, official sort of men.  I refused to 
question my sanity. 
It was the weird, falling light.  It was the disturbing sounds of the forest.  It was the rising 
mystery of the night.  All conspiring with my own fickle mind to confuse me. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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230 
They led me across the street, between the two buildings, back across the alley and 
through the courtyard, until we were delivered at the front of the hotel once more.  A long, black 
limousine waited at the curb.  It was ancient, if immaculately shined and preserved.  I guessed it 
was manufactured in the nineteen-sixties. 
The suit at my back shoved me across the lawn, in the direction of the car.  I must have 
hesitated at the sight of it, though it was not a conscious action.  The windows of it were blackly 
tinted and impenetrable.  Anyone and anything might be lurking within, I thought, but I was 
pretty certain that, whoever it was, it wasn’t the government.  It wasn’t law enforcement. 
With a metallic thump that spoke of well engineered components, the rear passenger door 
of the limo popped open.  The first suit pulled it wide, and stood to one side, indicating I should 
climb inside.  His eyes blazed like white diamonds caught in the sun.  His expression brooked no 
discussion. 
Shrugging, I surrendered myself to my fate, and climbed inside.  Nothing and no one 
could have prepared me for the meeting that followed. 
Let me simply say that there are two kinds of truth.  The first sort comes from what we 
know secondhand.   The second sort comes from what we know from our own very real personal 
experiences.  Neither sort is fully trustworthy.  Much of it is guesswork and outright lies.  They 
lie to us, whoever ‘they’ might be at the moment.  We lie to ourselves.  In fact, only fools are not 
hard pressed to determine where the lies end and the truth begins. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
231 
The man sitting on the far side of that rear seat was both.  A truth.  A lie.  His was a face I 
knew well.  When I saw it, everything fell into place.  The beginning.  The middle.  The end.  
Her, too. 
“You’re dead,” I stated simply, my eyes wide.  Long accustomed to shock, I was 
nonetheless surprised.  Stunned.  An electric vibration hummed within the core of my being. 
He laughed.  His teeth were crooked and yellow, evidence of his old world attitude that 
cared nothing for self-preservation.  In fact, he was puffing a large cigar and sipping from a glass 
of cognac at the moment. 
“I suppose we all are, in a certain sense of the word.”  He tipped his balding head toward 
a wet bar that was opened opposite our seat.  “Drink.”  His drooping jowls jiggled with the 
motion of it. 
The door at my elbow slammed shut.  The limo started off at once.  I couldn’t see the 
driver for the visor raised between us.  I could scarcely see through the windows for the tint.  I 
knew nobody could see inside. 
“It’s good to see you again, John,” he offered glibly.  His face was smeared with a 
sardonic humor, a goading gloat.  “We worried.” 
“We.” 
“Those of us that care, John.  Those of us that know you for what you truly are.” 
“Like the child molester you sent along to find me.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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232 
He smiled, and tipped his head toward the bar again.  I accepted, and leaned across my 
knees to slide onto a padded bench that framed the tiny serving table.  Filling a crystal tumbler 
with cubes and Southern Comfort, I returned to the bench to sit opposite him. 
“You look well, for a dead man,” I offered eventually, when the liquor had burned a 
measure of resolve into my gut. 
“I might say the same to you.” 
I ignored the implications of his statement.  “What do you want from me.” 
“Same as always, John.  We want you to play.” 
“Play what.  I’m too old for the game, and you know it.” 
His reply was a deep, throaty chuckle that smacked of avarice and self-indulgence.  
“There are games, John, and then there are games.” 
Sizing me with his steady gaze, he sipped and smoked and was silent for a time.  Behind 
him, the town scrolled past the limo’s windshields.  We rounded that same tired stop sign, and 
headed toward the city limits. 
As we passed the Town Store, I saw the old woman, Bonnie, standing on her porch, one 
hand on her ample hip, the other shading her squinted gaze.  With an owl’s liquid neck, she 
watched us pass.  We drove on without slowing. 
“John,” he sighed, “For a smart kid, you’re one dumb son of a bitch.  You know that.”  
He laughed and sipped from his drink, and then his cigar, his jowls jiggling with the movements 
of it.  His eyes were mocking.  “Hot damn, but I could never figure you.  Of them all, you were 
the greatest... question.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
233 
“Never great enough.” 
Returning a shrug, he turned to watch the greenery scroll past his window.  I stared at the 
balding pate of the back of his head.  “Nobody is EVER great enough, John.  Genghis Kahn, 
Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon, Adolph Hitler, his best friend and lover, Joseph Stalin,” laughing 
again he nodded out the window at Bonnie.  “Bitches like that, there.  Nobody lives forever.   
Nobody rules forever.” 
“Not even you.” 
“Not even me, kid, right.”  He finished his cognac, and set the glass into a holder in the 
armrest of the door at his elbow.  “Especially not me, John.  You know, you get there and you 
got it, and it’s only then that you realize there’s a whole world of people lined up behind you, 
elbowing and pushing and shoving and, sometimes, killing to get where you are.  You get this 
sinking feeling in your gut... I did anyway... because you know that the next stop after arrival is 
yet another departure.  Once you get it, John, whatever it is, the next thing to come is losing it.  
You’ll drop it in boredom or someone else will come along and take it away from you.  If it, 
whatever it is, has any value at all, I mean.” 
I smiled.  “Like they scrambled to fill your seat, as soon as it was emptied.” 
“Exactly.  Did you know, John, they had a party - a fucking PARTY, John - afterwards.  
Did you know they toasted my absence all night long.” 
It was my turn to shrug and finish my drink with a long gulp.  “Some of them are 
drinking in your name to this day, I’m sure.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
234 
His glance at me was sharp and immediate.  It was the look of a man that has found his 
dog in the trash.  It asked if I knew where I stood.  It wondered if I realized the leash was 
collared about my neck, and held in his hand, rather than the other way about.  My return was 
defiance.  I didn’t care.  I couldn’t care.  What more could he and his kind do to me, my own 
eyes asked.  What worse was there. 
He shook his head and his loose jowls danced.  His face was deadly and serious, and he 
sucked on his cigar with an enigmatic resolve.  “One dumb son of a bitch,” he breathed, exhaling 
a plume of smoke.  “I could never figure you.  Every time I thought I had you pegged, you’d go 
off and do something I couldn’t understand.  Like a madman in command of an army, there 
seemed to be no method to your tactics or strategies, yet you always seemed to... arrive just 
where you thought you should be.  On field or off.” 
I slid across the way to fill my glass once more.  It was good whiskey, and I saw no 
reason to abstain.  He offered his own tumbler.  He didn’t have to say, I knew what he liked, so I 
made it for him. 
“I learned young,” I replied eventually, reveling in the heady smell of the fine cognac that 
I was pouring into his crystal glass, “To get what I want with my mind.” 
“That business at the end...” he hinted, shaking his head with disapproval.  “It was brutal 
and senseless.” 
I stared at him hard and long while I drained my second glass, and I immediately poured 
another, before returning his own cup and sliding back into my seat opposite him.  “That’s your 
opinion.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
235 
“Why.”  He asked the ultimate question. 
I shrugged and stared out the heavily tinted window at his back.  I thought we might cross 
the bridge, as I saw it looming on the near horizon before us now, but, no, the driver slowed and 
turned left onto a side road.  He smiled to see the slight dismay that must have shown on my 
face, but said nothing at all about it. 
“Why what.”  I returned dully, feigning ignorance. 
“Why did you do it.” 
“Who says I did it.  Besides everybody, I mean.” 
He was still shaking his head, and didn’t stop to sip from his freshened drink.  “Every 
time I thought I had you pegged... and so I’ve decided, John, that you are one of two things.  You 
are either the dumbest and, at the same time, the luckiest bastard I have ever met...” 
“Or.” I prompted after a long moment had passed in silence.  I wasn’t here for the 
company, after all. 
“Or, you’re just plain nuts.” 
“Sometimes, I wonder myself.” 
“The worry of it, John, at least for me, is that a combination of unfathomable insanity and 
obvious genius is a dangerous mixture.  Like fuel and air.  Add the right amount of pressure, and 
you have ignition, don’t you.  Combustion.  A vast burning.  Great destruction.” 
“A man should go down in a blaze of glory, I guess.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
236 
“Glory.”  He laughed, “You’re crazier than I thought you might be, if you believe that!  
Glory, John.  Jesus-H-Christ on a crutch, boy, you had all of that a man could ever get on the 
field, didn’t you.  Wasn’t that enough.” 
“No.” 
“Afterward, your face sprayed across the nation, in fact, across the world, so you were an 
article to millions.  Wasn’t that enough.” 
“I guess not.” 
Waggling a finger at my face, his own face red and swollen with the consumption of 
alcohol, he brayed, “Now I think I have you, John!  Now I believe I see!  It was all about holding 
on, wasn’t it.  To the last little bit.  The final fingertip.  Was that it.” 
I glanced away, and thought of that same party so long ago, of the has-been hero and his 
maudlin rambling.  I thought how power was the ultimate drug, better than heroin or cocaine or 
even money, because, I knew from experience, if you had the power, everything else was 
incidental and could be had in its own time.  With power came the world, and with enough 
power driven by the proper ambition, the world could be owned. 
“You really pissed me off, you know.”  He growled petulantly. 
“Yeah, I know.” 
“I lost a lot of money.” 
“More than you won.”  My tone was sharp and accusatory.  He was whining.  Nobody 
likes a whiner. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
237 
“Not all at once, but more than I ever won in a single game.  Ten games put together, 
maybe.  We all had... a lot... riding on you that day.” 
“I was happy to let you down.” 
He chuckled deeply, darkly, a craven lunatic that had his hands about the very neck he 
had for so long lusted to strangle.  “You did more damage than you could ever know, boy.” 
“Really.”  I sipped from my drink coolly.  “Do you think, really.  More than I could ever 
know.  You’re not giving me much credit.” 
“Fucking egomaniac!” he spat.  “You were nothing!  Even at the top of your curve, you 
were nothing!  A fucking spec, that’s all!  A god damned Iowa farm boy, fresh from the fields!  
That’s all you ever were.” 
I felt my gaze flatten and darken.  “Fuck you, asshole.” 
We had come to stalemate.  We sat in silence and stared at each other for a time.  His 
eyes were sparkling pig’s eyes, that burned with a distant bon-fire blaze of lunacy and stark, 
naked malice.  He would murder me happily, I knew, with his own two hands, if he could 
manage it. 
I broke the silence with a roll of my eyes and a rise of my shoulders.  Turning my 
attention to my drink, I raised it to my lips, and said, around the flowing liquid, “I fixed you up 
just right, I thought.” 
He slapped the glass from my hand, so the whiskey in it sprayed across the passenger 
cabin of the limo.  I was surprised by the sudden violence of it, and started forward to punch him 
in the mouth. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
238 
At the same moment, however, the black visor that separated our compartment from the 
driver started down with the whine of an electric motor.  There, sitting in the passenger seat, was 
a big, black dock that wore a thick, iron collar and that shone it’s brilliant, diamond blue eyes 
upon me with much hunger and bloody desire. 
I eased back into my seat, even as the visor rose once more.  He smoothed his ruffled 
shirt and slacks, and sucked on his cigar.  Both our empty glasses lay on the floorboard, and 
washed back and forth with each bump, sway and turn of the car. 
“Yeah, I guess you did, at that.” 
“All from a spec.  A bastard farm boy from Iowa, and you, the fucking king of your 
world.” 
“Still, it wasn’t you that pushed the button.” 
“Wasn’t it.” 
That started him forward again, his palm open, but I think he realized almost immediately 
that not even his dogs would save him the next time he touched me that way.  I thought of 
shotguns and brains laid out on a gravel drive.  I thought of my stiffened fingers and his soft, 
fleshy throat. 
He feigned a nonchalant laugh.  “Oh, well, it was bound to happen sooner or later.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
239 
I was still angry, though, and pushed it a step further.  Always a step further. “Yet 
it came sooner, rather than later, don’t you agree.” 
“Prick.  You’ll get yours, too.  Don’t you see it.  Don’t you feel it.  That’s the 
way it is.  You get there, but you can’t stay.” 
“I haven’t come to that realization.” 
“You’re HERE, John!  How can you have anything.  Anything, at all.  It’s not 
even a matter of when, anymore.  It’s already HAPPENED!” 
“I have what’s inside my own head, old man.  That’s all anybody ever has.  I have 
the truth of it, every minute, every second, of it.” 
“You’re talking about peace of mind.  It can’t be enough.” 
“Maybe.  Maybe not.” 
“I don’t understand you at all, John.  Not one little bit.” 
“We come from two different planets, don’t we.  How could you understand.  To 
you, coming up the way you did in the lap of luxury, everything’s a game.  While to me, 
having had to fight for every little scrap, everything is a brutal, harsh reality.  While you 
were playing, I was working.” 
“Working hard, too, I suppose.” 
“Hard enough.  I learned that a man can do and become anything he wants to do 
or become, if he wants that thing enough.  You said I was a spec, well, I say you are a 
spec.  An insect.  A parasite.  You are a stupid, ignorant man, and your power could 
never belie that fact.  You are a shallow vessel, and no amount of gluttony could ever fill 
your emptiness.  You are a coarse, base animal, and no amount of refinement could cover 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
240 
your crassness.  Cunning is no substitute for genuine intelligence.  Guile is no stand-in 
for education. 
“You...” I sighed, remembering it all so wearily, “Were simply an ugly little man 
that would train his animals viciously, then send them out to spill blood viciously.  Were 
you really so surprised when one turned to bite you.” 
He paused, and seemed to genuinely consider the question.  “Yes.  I was terribly 
surprised.  You can’t imagine the shock of it.” 
I smiled.  “Thanks.  That was a compliment, I think.” 
“In a way.  In a way, it was the time of day.  It means nothing.  Nothing at all.” 
My smile broadened, “As I recall, it meant a great deal.  Let’s see,” I hedged, 
pretending to struggle to remember, though the pictures of it came as luridly and instantly 
to my thoughts as only the fondest memories could.  “You were eating dinner, weren’t 
you.  It was a dish with noodles.  You know why I remember that bit of it.  Because I 
couldn’t tell where the noodles ended and your guts began, from the pictures they printed 
in the paper.   They found your right arm across the street, didn’t they.” 
His face went pale and doughy.  He seemed to remember it all for himself, and it 
was his turn to look away. 
“I thought it must have been quick, at first, the explosion made such a mess of the 
place.  Then,” I added gleefully, “I read further, and learned that you lived for nearly a 
half hour, afterward.  You made it all the way to the hospital, before they declared you 
dead.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
241 
The moment that hung between us then was long and deep and black and leaden 
as the mass of a deep, brimming ocean.  “That was the best part of you, I thought.  Your 
end.   A blaze of glory.” 
“Fuck you!”  He rounded on me, “It’s not smart, you talking to me that way.  Not 
here.  Not in this place.” 
“What have I to fear from dead men.” 
“Perhaps from dead men you have the most to fear.  After all, everybody’s a dead 
man sooner or later, aren’t they.  There are several here, like me, that remember you for 
what you really are.  Or were.  Still, it wasn’t you that pushed the button, was it.  It had 
nothing to do with you.” 
“So what.  It happened somehow in the end.  That was good enough.” 
“Just as it will happen to you, some day.” 
“Some day,” I agreed simply. 
The car slowed, and spun hard right again, this time turning onto a narrow and 
obviously private drive.  We passed beneath an over-arching gate of scrolled ironwork.  
Words were made there that I could not read. 
“This your place.” I wondered aloud, hoping I sounded more careless about the 
situation than I felt.  As with the descent of night in the forest, this place chilled me.  I 
was certain it was nowhere I wanted to be. 
He chuckled and his eyes blazed maliciously.  “There are kingdoms, John, even in 
hell, with kings to rule them, and palaces to rule them from.” 
His chuckle turned to unbound laughter, hilarity.  Soon enough, I would learn 
why. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
242 

 

Q 

Question With An Open End 

I saw a funny picture, once.  It was of three fishes, each swimming the same 
direction in a line, arranged from the smallest to the largest in order.  Each had its mouth 
wide open, ready to gulp the one before, so the big fish would eat the smaller fish, only to 
be devoured by a bigger fish still.  I always had an impression of a larger fish yet, unseen 
beyond the range of the picture's frame.  Beyond that fish, another larger again, so on into 
infinity, I guessed, like a mirror that reflected a mirror that reflected a mirror... 
The message was not lost on me, yet neither was it fully realized.  Because I could 
never guess just how small the smallest fish truly was, nor how large the largest might be.  
It was a question with an open an end, and therefore had no solution.  It was infinity, in 
that it was a quantity, a number, a size, an adjective, to which a greater thing could 
always be appended.  For every large, there was a larger.  For every small, there was a 
smaller. 
Where was I on the chain, I often wondered.  Each time I wondered, I came to a 
new solution, and so clung to a new answer. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
243 
Each time I tried to see myself in my place, and felt that I had surely defined the 
ultimate description of it all, I was surprised to find that I understood nothing.  I had, in 
fact, misconstrued every slightest bit of evidence and misinterpreted every clue. 
Then the answer would come anew, and the picture painted over to the final, 
finished product that I imagined it to be.  Then the picture hung on its wall to stand 
before my admiration for a time, perfect, beautiful, solid as the wall that held it. 
Then a second glance at it, and all was askew, out of kilter, awry.  All the wrong 
colors shown in all the wrong places.  Misunderstanding shadowed what comprehension 
should shine.  Disbelief highlighted what faith should conceal.  Misdirection betrayed the 
flow of the lines and textures, where lines and textures should not be. 
Now, taken the painting down again and the brush between my teeth, I sat in the 
back seat of that car and passed beneath that black iron gate, and prepared to rework my 
picture of the world.  I imagined immediately that the scale was nowhere near to true.  
From the bias of pessimism, I had last painted myself small among the greater schemes of 
the frame.  Yet again, I was sure it was not enough.  I might draw myself smaller still.  I 
was not a guppy to be gulped by an angelfish.  I was a microbe consumed by other 
microbes, only slightly larger than I was. 
When shown in comparison and contrast to the likes of this place into which we 
entered with the smooth glide of pneumatic suspension, I was convinced that my 
existence was borne on a dust mote, which dust mote should, by chance, come up against 
the hand of God, or the devil, occasionally and in passing, as it would today. 
Therefore, I passed through the boundaries and into the heartland of that place.  
One step of ten thousand steps.  One direction of countless.  One choice of many. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
244 
He sat beside me, and the dogs sat before me.  Again, I wondered aloud, "What is 
this place." 
He shrugged, "I've never been inside."  He said it with relief.  "But you, John.  
You're getting the grand tour, from what I understand."  Since this seemed to make him 
so happy, I felt my own face pale and wax doughy.  "Ah-ha!" he gloated.  "There, I see it 
in you now, I think!  The sick realization.  Perhaps you have indeed fallen so completely 
from your pedestal that you shall never rise again.  It is obvious to me." 
The car rounded a corner screened by high hedges, and we arrived at the front 
steps of a palace.  "After you walk through that door," he added smugly, with a tip of his 
balding head and a jiggle of his soft jowls, "It should be obvious to you." 
Having said this, the door at my shoulder popped open.  A tall, thin, old man 
stood there in immaculate livery of green and blue.  He wore a smart cap that spoke of an 
older time.  His eyes sparkled and burned with a familiar passion.  Bowing, he indicated I 
should exit the vehicle and climb the steps to the front doors. 
I turned to face him that would fetch me.  "I am never afraid.  You should know 
that."  I climbed out onto the marble flagstones.  The place was huge, and I craned my 
neck to take it all in from so near a vantage. 
At my back, as the door started shut, he growled, "You may be fortunate enough 
that we should meet again, John.  Then again..." and he fell silent with the departure of 
his long, sleek automobile. 
I watched it roar around the bend in the drive and out of sight.  A soft touch at my 
elbow reminded me gently there were steps to climb. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
245 
Jerking my elbow away roughly, I turned my attention on the door attendant.  His 
frame bent and stooped with age, yet he endeavored to remain erect.  A flare of his gaze 
pointedly indicated that once he had been a very dangerous man, and, indeed, that he 
remained so to this day. 
"If you will, sir," he rasped, his voice the grate of hob nailed boots tramping 
through gravel.  "This way."  His shoulders turned to indicate the steps and the towering 
facade of the palace, its columned porch awaiting me as the platform of a gallows. 
"And if I will not." 
His grin came with thin lips and was sterile, void of semantics.  It was a 
perfunctory motion.  "We should not think of such unpleasantness, I am sure."  When I 
remained fixed in place, he started up alone, his back seeming to command that I follow.  
"If what I have heard of you is true, sir, then it would seem to me you will comply, if 
only to see what you may see."  He stopped climbing the stairs, which act was obviously 
painful to him, and turned once more to face me.  "Or I have it all wrong." 
I wished to God with all the earnestness of my soul that he had it all wrong.  Yet, 
I found my right foot fallen on the first step, then my left mounting the second.  I 
followed, one foot before the other. 
"We are pleased to entertain you, sir," he announced dreadfully, once more 
climbing the steps with me.  Each step came with a grunt and groan of rheumatic effort.  
"Your reputation has preceded you." 
"Has it.  You get the news, I guess." 
He chuckled without any sense of real mirth.  "No, indeed, and no deliveries of 
fresh milk, either, sir.  Still, we get by with what we have." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
246 
"We.  Who are your friends upstairs." 
"Oh, well, sir... that wouldn't be my place, would it.  To make introductions, I 
mean.  It's a place for others.  That's one thing an old man learns eventually, no matter 
where he has been or what he has done.  Eventually, a man learns to keep his place in the 
world." 
"What happens if he doesn't know his place."  I was happy to goad him.  He 
seemed so certain of his reason, while I was equally certain he was ignorant or brain-
washed, or both. 
"Well, then, sir, I would guess that man is a lost man, indeed.  Wouldn't you." 
"Sure, I suppose." 
"Yet one is never lost for long, is one.  Even a lunatic wandering the wilderness 
must one day come to rest, mustn't he." 
"One way or another." 
I climbed a stair above him, and he smiled at my back.  I could hear it in his tone, 
when he said, "It is in fact true what was rumored of you, sir.  Your wit is matchless." 
"Matchless.  Is that sarcasm." 
"Indeed, no, sir.  Not at all.  As I have said, we are pleased to entertain you.  
Honored.  We have prepared our very best for you, sir.  We-" but he stopped, mid-word. 
A pair of large, black dogs peered over the top tier, their eyes bristling with a 
malicious light.  He dipped his ancient head, and appeared to find his place in the world, 
once more. 
"This way, sir," he breathed roughly, "If you please." 
"I don't like dogs, you know." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
247 
"No, we didn't know, sir, but they will not molest you.  Have no fear." 
"I am never afraid."  I repeated it silently, and wished I could believe with 
sufficient repetition.  It was not to be, and I was very much afraid. 
For the unknown is the greatest source of fear.  Entry into it is a blind leap.  It is 
faith, the ultimate trust, to venture into the indefinite.  To wonder what it is, then discover 
it, and define it.  The unknown that would be known is Mallory, standing at the foot of 
his mountain, his palm shading eyes that would see what no other man would see, his feet 
poised on the brink to rise to heights no other man could know.  The question that would 
be answered is the focus of every eye opened to inquire, of every finger prying to find, of 
every palm gripping to feel, then, perhaps, to crush. 
For, the solution of a thing is its ownership.  The understanding of an enigma 
renders the enigma impotent, so it becomes less an obstacle or mystery and more a trick 
of mirrors and the light. 
Therefore, the unknown is terror that would cow and control.  The unknown is the 
hand of a monster falling heavy in the night. 
The only method of overcoming that terror is knowledge.  The only way to know 
is to go there and see it.  As Mallory would make the first footfall of the ten thousand that 
would lead him his winding way up to, perhaps, the summit, then half the way down 
again. 
Half way down again… not all the way.  With some trepidation, I followed the 
suddenly silent old man, and we climbed together to the gallows pole. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
248 
Half way down again, which is to say, he never came back at all, but remains 
there to this day, half-buried in rubble, a well-frozen corpse that will perhaps last forever.  
Yet, it had never been the man's intention to both go there and return.  The former part 
was the focus of the endeavor, and the latter but a sideline, a nicety.  It would be fine to 
return home, again, I knew, but more likely that I would not.  Therefore, it must be 
enough that I should climb up to the top and see for myself what the mysterious 
vagueness of ignorance concealed. 
That leap of faith required a complete surrender to whatever might be waiting 
below.  No half-measures would suffice.  Nothing would shed light on the darkness 
without burning.  There was no way to climb the mountain without using my own two 
feet. 
No matter the consequence, the only direction was forward.  The only way was 
ahead.  I climbed the steps, and was delivered at the top to stand alongside those well-
heeled dogs, before those two massive portals that were the gaping maw of... the 
brooding unknown. 
The door attendant preceded me across the porch to lay his hand on a brass 
handle.  Before he pulled it wide, however, he paused to address me one last time.  "You 
are, in many ways, not what I expected, sir.  I hope we shall have the pleasure of meeting 
again." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
249 
With those apparently formal words, he pulled the door wide.  Immediately, a 
gust of cool wind struck my face.  Yet, it did not reek of burning brimstone, as I had 
imagined it might.  Rather, it held a hint of spearmint and perfumes, of pretty young 
women.  I felt a smile cross my lips, unbidden, at the touch of the scent.  It was instantly 
intoxicating. 
"Yeah," I replied distantly, feeling my mind rushing to separate from my body, so 
my voice came from a great distance within my own head.  "Likewise, I'm sure." 
Dragging leaden feet across the threshold, I entered beyond, and the door was 
eased shut, and locked, at my back.  I thought I heard the dogs whining, pouting to miss 
their feast. 
"Holy shit," I gasped, without thinking.  I was the Iowa farm boy, again, dirt 
behind my ears, gawking in ignorance.  The hall that greeted me towered twenty meters 
high and wide, and stretched a kilometer in length before me.  Priceless works of art and 
antiquity hung on the walls and crouched in the corners.  Terra cotta warriors and knights 
of armor guarded each doorway that branched to left and right.  The floor was an 
iridescent stone, which glittered mystically in the bloody light of the declining sun, as it 
filtered through the brilliant mosaic of a domed glass ceiling. 
This last, more than anything else, drew my attention.  It was a fanciful work, all 
flowing scroll of strangeness in its words and its forms, which were images of what must 
be gods toiling in their heavens, or of devils laboring at their hells.  They struggled, 
awash in a crimson sea of the sun, colored, as they were, by the harsh hues of cut glass 
the color of blood.  I was certain those indecipherable words held the secrets of the 
universe or were esoteric spells of immense power. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
250 
Undirected, I followed my eyes away from the door, and was anxious to see it 
all… to understand it all.  This thing that was incomprehensible. 
The staccato rap of hard heels upon the harder floor distracted me.  I glanced 
down, first at my feet to be certain I hadn't floated away into those rivers of gore above 
my head, then forward at a figure cast in flowing white that strode along the hall at its far 
end, obviously bound for me. 
Even from so great a distance, I was immediately certain it was the form of a 
woman, a beautiful woman.  The material of her raiment was so slight and ethereal that it 
flowed about her body with the grace of vapors stirred on a gentle breeze.  Her strides 
were forceful and assured. 
As she neared, and I was able to discern her features for the harsh contrast the 
brooding ceiling would cast over all, I determined that her eyes were black, as was her 
hair.  While her face was pale.  Her lips and fingertips were red. 
I knew... long before I could see, really see, her face, that it was HER.  Something 
in my chest squeezed tightly shut.  I felt my knees weaken and my eyesight begin to dim 
from the lack of circulation.  I was certain that I was dying, and staggered to keep my 
feet. 
Nobody could blame me for this fumble, I thought, it was a blind-side tackle.  
Blow the fucking whistle, coach! 
Then I looked again.  It wasn't her. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
251 
It was another, a man.  Of long, flowing black hair and raven eyes, but otherwise 
completely dissimilar from the devil I had known.  He was dressed in simple silk robes 
that worn in an eastern style.  His eyes blazed fiercely, though they were indecipherably 
dark and deep. 
As he neared, I remained fixed in his gaze.  It leveled me.  No, it lowered me.  It 
let me down to the rate of a small dog at the heels of one much larger.  It rendered all my 
hopes and aspirations as nothing.  I was a spec.  I was an insect.  He would handle and 
admire, or discard and crush.  I instinctively knew nothing else existed between the two 
distant ends of his intent. 
He smiled, and it came with a row of even, white teeth that shimmered in the 
bloody light and seemed to run with gore.  "John.  Good of you to come."  His voice 
melodic and at the same time a masculine bass, he extended his left hand, but not to offer 
it for my touch.  Rather, he made a mysterious sign with it, and bowed slightly, as he 
came to stand before me. 
"You could not pronounce my name properly with your barbarian's tongue," he 
enthused, obviously stating fact, rather than pointing a direct insult.  "Therefore, you may 
simply address me as Joshua.  Does that name well suit you." 
I only nodded, though I tried to speak.  My mouth worked open and shut, but 
rebelled and would utter no sound. 
"So fine, and so, good."  He reached out to guide me by my shoulder toward one 
of the nearby doorways, but, again, he did not touch.  "What have you to say, on such a 
fine day as this." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
252 
"It's evening," I remarked, conscious of the sun's falling light, where it bled 
through the luminescent ceiling.  I thought I heard someone gasp in the echoes, to hear 
me correct so genuine an overlord. 
"Dear, dear, John," he sighed patiently, his words only slightly lilted with the bias 
of an accent, "You will learn eventually that the measure of night and day is a primitive 
one, as is the struggling beat of your heart.  It is a quantity of seconds counted as the 
grains of sand, and as meaningful as a beach full of such grains.  Seconds," he sighed 
dismissing the world with it, "Minutes, hours, days, John.  Years.  What are they, but 
collections of breaths.  What are your breaths, but the grains of sand as scattered over a 
vast beach of similar grains. 
"Where death is unknown, time is unknown.  Were you aware.  As it should be.  
For, in absence of death, a measure of time becomes as meaningless as a measure of 
pennies before an unreasonably vast mound of wealth."  Again, with a touch that never 
truly fell, he guided me across the way, toward the shadow of an arch, which branched a 
hall off the main corridor.  "Invariably, whether they know it or not, every man or woman 
that would grasp for power or money or influence of any kind, charitable or evil, can be 
said to be, in truth, reaching for immortality.  For it is life everlasting that is the promise 
of God and his archangel, is it not.  The ultimate kingdom, I hear, where the soul shall 
forever live, for good or ill. 
"What a kind and generous gift that must be, John.  Do you not agree." 
I tried again, but could not speak.  I nodded, instead. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
253 
"It is the greatest wealth, then, life everlasting.  For with immortality comes time, 
John, like a well-trained lap dog, to do as you would have of it, now or eventually.  
'When' ceases to matter, and becomes an archaic word of lost intent.  When, indeed, 
John." and he laughed blackly, his teeth white beneath the fine trim of his well-groomed, 
encircling beard.  "How strange it is, to speak with one of flesh and blood of such things!  
You will pardon me, I am sure, if I seem thrilled at the prospect!" 
I stopped in mid-stride, awed at the room that waited beyond that dark doorway.  
It was a vast pool of shimmering water, which smelt of flowers and washed gently back 
and forth to the rhythm of a falls at the far end.  Colorful tiles covered the interior, every 
inch of it seeming to tell a story of pictures cast in stone.  What I was certain were 
precious gems sparkled here and there among the works; red rubies or white diamonds 
for eyes, emeralds set where whole fields of the deepest green burned beneath the light, 
which, as ever, came from above, through a glass ceiling that was, itself, a work of art. 
Young girls frolicked nakedly in the surf, and instantly came to us, their eyes 
averted, their faces smiling strangely.  Without a word, they stripped me and led me to 
the edge of the pool, urged me to enter into its water, dragged me to its pearly depths.  
Where I floated, bathed, and washed with the rushing waters of the falls. 
After a lifetime of soft lingering, during which time the sad sun surrendered to its 
final descent and was replaced by a full burning moon that I could not see but for its blue 
light, we emerged at the far side, near the roaring flood of waters that replenished the 
bath and washed it clean of me.  At the top stair of the ascent, I accepted robes of the 
finest design, and was clad in them wet. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
254 
Touching me gently where every man so longs to be touched, whispering 
unknown words within the shells of my ears, the girls bore me to a setting of couches and 
plush divans.  They dressed me in attire similar to my host's, and indicated I should sit in 
a particular place. 
Bowing their heads, their faces plastered with the same odd, intoxicating smiles, 
they backed away.  When I turned again, he was there, sitting beside me. 
"Ah, so much better," he breathed through his nose.  "I thought they might never 
wash the stink of it away!" 
I smelled myself instinctively.  It was true.  I could no longer smell the foul forest 
on my person.  I was clothed in the aroma of fine, beautiful things, which was this place 
in its entirety. 
"Thanks.  I guess."  I returned, not knowing what else to say.  I hoped to seem 
flippant.  "So, Joshua, how's business." 
His smile broadened, and he reclined coolly.  "So smug.  I like a bit of character 
in a man, I think.  I like it in you, at least." 
"Thanks, again." 
"'Thanks'," he mocked, rolling his eyes.  "It is sadly apparent we have not been 
properly introduced, but it is a failure of my own lack of graciousness, and owes nothing 
to you.  Still, it is such a waste of time, you see, to attempt to strike fear into a man, amid 
such surroundings as these..." the flighty sweep of his arm indicated the chamber, and the 
countless chambers beyond.  "I would think any mortal man would be much impressed 
by my mere possession of such things.  Apparently, I am mistaken." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
255 
I shrugged, struggling back into my Johnny Bullet suit and the fine silk clothing 
in the same instant.  With much effort, I envisioned myself standing behind center, 
calling for the ball.  Time to run, Johnny Boy, time to run! 
"I've seen the Taj Mahal, friend.  What is there, after that, but second-hand knock 
offs."  I hoped to insult him.  If I was to suffer in this thing, I thought it best to be 
finished with it quickly.  I only liked to play when I held command of the field. 
If possible, his smile broadened further still.  "What would you say, Dearest John, 
if I told you I built the Taj, too.  I built many other similar places that you both know and 
do not know." 
I scoffed with a toss of wind from the corner of my lips, and returned 
immediately, "I'd say you were full of shit."  However, I didn't believe it, not really.  
Anything was possible, I knew, especially in this place, more so, perhaps, here than 
anywhere else. 
"To the point and concise.  Yes, well, perhaps you are correct.  The ownership of 
such things means nothing, really... but where to begin in this matter, John.  Where to 
start with you." 
"Let's start with what you want," I recited, "And we'll end with what you get."  I 
almost heard my own mother in it. 
"Now where have I heard that before, I wonder."  In an instant, his pleasant smile 
and mask of a face fell away, and was replaced by one of sharp, angular, features that 
raised shadows at his cheeks and about his eyes, which flared terribly with a mad lust.  
"Still, it is better to know the truth, is it not.  Have you not said the same thing yourself, 
many times and often, John. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
256 
"Very well, we start with what I want, which has much to do with what I am, I 
think.  First, you must know this, in order to know that.  It is well that you are sitting.  
Refresh yourself, as you require.  My home is your home." 
I returned his flat face.  "Including the front door."  
"Most particularly that, my friend.  Indeed, you have not entered into this place to 
perish.  You have not come so far, merely to stumble at my threshold.  No, your mystery 
has not yet run its full course, and so anything may happen.  Do not count yourself lost so 
easily.  I know the joys of victory, and the black depths of abysmal failure, you see, and 
perhaps it is true that I have felt it more dearly than you shall ever know, John, having 
felt it so long and so often. 
"For, I have carried a Macedonian shield to follow Alexander from one side of the 
world to another.  I have wailed for vengeance within the walls of Masada, even as I have 
in vengeance myself slain.  I have fought ten thousand battles and waged a thousand 
wars, and have thousands of men murdered with my own two hands.  I have happily 
sipped of my victims' blood and danced madly about countless fires in the night to sing of 
unwholesome appetites and chant over a grisly fare.  I have been a naked savage in the 
jungle, and I have worn the casements of personal steel.  I have stalked with sling and 
bow and spear.  I have drawn down the bolt and slid home the ramrod while hot in the 
throes of lead.  I have been a last grim face in many a last, dying vision, and I reckon a 
greater number lies yet before me on the field. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
257 
"I am that which every young man dreads and every old veteran fears.  I am the 
face of apocalypse moving across a famished land.  I am naked genocide, the predator of 
sleeping babes.  I am entrails and displaced brains.  I am rent limb and rendered flesh.  I 
am death, the destroyer of worlds. 
"All that is bloody and black I love.  All that is happiness and hope I loathe. 
"They are the gates of heaven upon which I lay my frustrated hands, and the gates 
of hell before which I am forced to stand.  No age has passed but that I have laid my foul 
grips upon it.  No innocence has faded but that I have placed my corrupting touch against 
it.  No work of evil begins but that I am its witness or rash participant. 
"The Khans kept me chained and collared as a dog within their courts.  The 
Pharaohs consulted me over limestone altars that reeked of burning flesh.  The Caesars 
skulked with me through the shadows of Rome, and with me enjoyed parlor games 
played out through the miserable course of many a man's unhappy life.  Czars have 
whispered to me behind the backs of their gory hands, and have listened to my answers 
with devils' ears.  While untold emperors great and forgotten have bridled me as a beast 
of burden to overtake the world upon my strong and willing back.  Yes, presidents and 
kings have stroked their knuckles against the dark metal of my iron doors to beg audience 
and banter vile politics. 
"When God wishes for something nasty with which to punish the land, it is I upon 
whom He invariably calls, and I that, invariably, happily answer. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
258 
"If you have known peace in your lifetime, then I am stale pages in musty books, 
or grim pictures in your morning newspaper.  I am yesterday or I am tomorrow, if I am 
not today.  Of that you may be certain.  For, while you sleep in comfort within the 
darkness that comes as a welcome recourse from your day, I am elsewhere to fill another 
darkness with unspeakable terror.  Yet, my eye remains fixed upon you, the undisturbed.  
If I have not visited you with my attentions of late, be glad, but do not be assured.  For an 
absence of pestilence is not an assurance of peace, rather it is contrarily an assurance of 
pestilence to come. 
"As every golden age has fallen into neglect.  For every Renaissance, there are 
Dark Ages to come or Dark Ages that have been.  If you are enlightened, then your father 
lived and died in ignorance, or so shall your children. 
"I have made it my obsession, and, while you may take no assurance from my 
absence, you may at least be assured by my presence.  Where I go, you die, and you do 
not forget. 
 "I am the whore that mongers herself from shadows.  Where the light does not 
shine, I am beautiful.  Where you, the buyer, are blind, I am perfect and glorious.  Yet, 
when I lay my unwholesome grip upon you to provide my service, you are aghast and 
appalled by the bestial nature of my disease.  Once afflicted, you bemoan your fell 
fortunes and curse me that would deliver your orgasm, even as you tremble in my grip, 
even as you thrash against my dirty body, even as you plunge yourself into me again and 
again, a rutting hound that has found a hole. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
259 
 "I covet your hypocrisies.  I gloat over your stupidities.  I harvest your hate even 
as I sow seeds of it throughout your streets.  When you turn your sidelong gaze upon me, 
I am demure.  When you approach my borders to ponder my substance, I am sweet as 
sugar.  You cannot help but come, and, in coming, you cannot help but succumb, and in 
succumbing, you cannot help but tear down your walls to immolate your world entire. 
"I do so love it all.  I love the flames and the billowing smoke.  Nothing is so 
beautiful as a bullet on the spin, as a sword raised on high, as a knife's blade flashing in 
the sun.  Nothing is so fulfilling as the sight of hemorrhage, nor nothing so alluring as the 
sound of tortured screams.  A dying man is a perfect picture painted on the canvass of the 
land, and mine the perfect hand to render it art. 
"So I say, I have stood fast behind a Macedonian shield.  I have wailed for 
vengeance within the aloof walls of high Masada.  I have been a Roman Centurion to 
command the field.  I have been mounted cavalry, and once rode a Tiger tank all the way 
to sight of Moscow.  I have wandered the deadly wastes of frozen Chosin, and I have 
strung Claymore mines triggered across a jungle trail.  You may believe it. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
260 
"Consider my camp as it has been variously pitched upon the banks of the Seine 
or among the brooding boughs of the Rein forests; consider my tent as it has been arrayed 
near Gettysburg or laid out on the Manchurian steppes; regard my table as it has stood 
within my sea bound cabin aboard HMS Victory or as it has been burned to save me from 
the murderous depths of a Russian winter; consider me, a dark man of cryptic 
countenance, a shadow to plague this business of shadows; concern yourself with my 
resolute gaze that takes a gleeful turn over the burning carnage of battle and is satisfied.  
Make yourself aware of my grip that takes up the haft of a sword and cries out for blood 
with a voice to make an average man incontinent and a great man weak.  Imagine that 
you are my enemy to stand upon the farthest hilltop with frowning face and liquid eye, 
which eye glimmers and fills from edge to edge with the bristle of spear and the sparkle 
of armor.  Imagine that you are Darius across the river, and I in league with Alexander as 
he fords the waters.  Think how I have stood across the table from France aboard the 
same wretched railcar that made me hate my own heart, and how I have gloated 
fiendishly to make those detestable people crawl. 
"Remember me, as likely you can, standing before the spoiled spires of Paris, my 
polished black boots harsh upon the cobbles, and watch my vile hand force the dog to eat 
its own feces.  Witness my triumphant salute and smug grin that dismisses entire nations 
even as it calls down their waste. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
261 
"Walk with me through the streets of a Berlin that has not been built.  Ponder with 
me an unnatural curiosity that delves into the actual destruction of the world with the 
innocence of a child that overturns a stone.  Stand with me upon a palisade before a sea 
of hateful faces that love their own hating with a mindless abandon, that love me with an 
obstinate passion; I, the ideal of a man that can do no wrong; I, the grimy hand that would 
lay touch upon the gates of our Lord and shake them to their foundations; I that would 
cry out VENGEANCE once more with a song of grinding heavy metal and thunderous 
high explosive. 
"Thus am I come and gone again.  Thus shall I ever be. 
 "It is my nature to be this fear from the time of Darkness, before the world, from 
the time I was cast out of Eden into these lands of horrible wilderness.  I have taken up 
the stone and stick from the days of Cain.  I have been the angry glint from Abraham's 
mad eyes, and the vengeance of David to lay waste to walls. 
"I stir the mortal regions of this demonic perdition from the first day and am 
doomed to disturb it to the last.  I have been death in times before your memory, before 
the parchment and the pen.  My image has been etched in blood on the stony walls of this 
world's dark underbelly by the grace of monkey's fingers, time and time again. 
"So do, John, do let's speak of the things you have seen.  Of the things you have 
done.  Do, Dearest John, let us hear of the places you have been."  He was smugly 
finished with it, and I felt it impossible to maintain my composure. 
I decided to play it straight.  I blew a long, whistling sigh, and slapped my knee 
the way my father, my stepfather I mean, had done. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
262 
"Hot shit!"  I gasped, showing my honest surprise to hear it.  "Well, I guess you 
could do a book, or something!"  I was the farm boy from Iowa, again, standing barefoot 
and half-naked, dirt behind my ears and beneath my nails, before a fine banker that would 
glare down upon my unworthiness with a haughty, disdainful eye.  "That's a HUGE pile 
of shit!  I mean," I laughed, despite myself, though the brooding mood of the room 
implied it was my own throat to be cut, "I've heard and told some whoppers in my time, 
boy, but that... Jesus-H-Christ-on-a-crutch, but THAT!"  I felt it coming then, an honest 
laughter, and I let it loose, though it sounded more madly anguished than I thought it 
should. 
His smile returned, as I finished, "I mean, what did you do, Josh.  Did you work it 
up in the bathroom just before you came down the hall to shake my hand.  Or is it 
something you remember from a high school play."  Merriment sprayed between my 
lips. 
Again, his smile broadened, which I decided was not a pleasant sort of thing, at 
all.  "You might be surprised to hear, John, how many doomed men, women, and 
children have laughed as you laugh.  In fact, it seems to me that I have had laughter from 
it as often as I have had screams.  Curious, I rarely considered such a thing before now.  
Still, what I have from it, generally, John, is silence.  Silence, did you know.  Could you 
guess. 
"That so many should perish without a word, without a motion."  He signed with 
his hand for a girl, who came to him and lay across his lap, petted as a kept animal.  
"Unexpected, do you not agree." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
263 
Stifling giggles, I tried to straightly reply.  "Like a deer caught in the headlights of 
a big rig, huh.  That the way of it, Josh, old buddy." 
Now his lips thinned a bit, though the smile remained.  He petted the girl heavily, 
and she squirmed only slightly, which fostered both my admiration and disgust for her.  
"Texas," he offered vaguely.  "Therein lies the sound of it.  There is where I have heard 
it, before now." 
It sobered me a bit, him reminding me of my adopted home.  His words, spoken 
so gently and yet with so much poisonous sarcasm and obvious loathing, reminded of 
warm June nights by the Gulf, and of the musty wind that blows off its muddy waters.  
Nothing at all like this place, I considered, bleakly, stifling a swell of dread and fear and 
terror and choking horror that bade me yearn to be some place, any place, but here, sitting 
before this... man. 
"Oh, yes, I have been there.  Many times.  There are places in Texas, Dear Friend 
John, wherein my hand is known more fondly than that of, say, God or Jesus." 
I nodded, shrugging off the attempts of another set of girls that would rub my 
shoulders and neck and ruffle my hair with sweetly scented fingers.  "Yeah, I think I've 
been there.  Little shit hole town just east of Houston, right." and I laughed again at my 
own non-existent joke.  "Or maybe it was south of San Antonio.  Or just east of El Paso!" 
"Perhaps and wherever, regardless, it is the tone of the place that amuses me so.  
The general... attitude of its people.  I would have to say, outside of certain places you 
could never know, that Texans compare well only in contrast to the French." 
"The French." I gasped, dismayed, as any true Texan would be. 
"Oh, you have been there.  Then you clearly see what I mean." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
264 
I brooded on that a moment, and shrugged the girls away again.  They were like 
lint on a good suit, though, and would not be so easily swept away. 
"Look, let's not piss each other off, unless we have to," I drawled.  "We should 
keep this friendly, I think." 
"Friendly," he stated flatly, mocking me.  Turning to his pet, he gushed, "And 
what do you think of a man that would goad a monster.  Foolish, is it not.  Much like 
those Greeks, or today, the Spaniards, jumping over bulls' horns and all that silliness.  To 
what point, John, push me.  To what end." 
"That it should come quickly and be finished, I guess." 
"Despite what I have said about the absurdity of time's passage in this place of 
eternity." 
"Yeah.  So."  Now the girls were reeling me in with their fingers and their lips.  
Hot chasers of sensation followed along just beneath my flesh wherever their collective 
touch might flow, and wherever it went I was wont to follow. 
"Once, John, a peasant came before me as I sat upon one throne or another, I 
forget which, having done some obscure trick to amuse me.  To him I granted his one 
fondest wish.  He so surprised me with the cleverness of his request, you see, that I gave 
it to him on the spot! 

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265 
"He asked for a kingdom of his own, John.  A thing few might have dared to 
demand.  A kingdom, entire, so easily bestowed!  With a wave of my seraph it was done, 
and he was carried away to rule his kingdom."  He turned his pouting attention from the 
girl to me again.  "It was no small hill of villages, either, John, but a land full of peoples, 
as large, larger in many ways, than my own!  So, you see, it was no small thing to be 
done, or to be had.  Yet, he had it.  On the instant." 
When he stopped speaking abruptly, I started away from the attention of all those 
fingers and damnable mouths to see him manipulating the woman in his lap harshly and 
with obvious lust. 
He began again, his tone fallen an octave, from passion, I thought, or anger.  "Do 
you know, it was not years later that he was back again at my gates." 
I smirked, and laid my head back to allow the tracing of a tongue just beneath my 
right ear.  "Come home again for a reunion, I bet." 
"Yes, a reunion, John, of the finest kind, of biting steel and reeking blood and 
slippery guts!  There, before the gates of my capitol city, I slaughtered his army, one man 
to the last, until it was but him kneeling before me, blooded and trembling, yet alive.  I 
kept him that way, you see, for many years to come." 
"Really."  I wondered obscurely, scarcely focused on his voice, yet hearing every 
word.  "Why." 

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266 
"I wanted what was worst for him, John, and death was not that thing, at the time.  
It was, in fact, the greatest mercy I might have bestowed upon him, at the time.  No, I 
kept him long enough that he might learn to love his life again.  I kept him long enough 
for him to know the absence of all the finest things I had granted him.  I kept him until it 
seemed he had forgotten his crimes, but was content to merely waste within the walls of 
my keep, fed from day to day and kept as one might keep a goat in a stable. 
"For he was a peasant, did I say.  Even as base as it was, it was a finer life than he 
had known before his fate had taken its first magical twist." 
He stopped speaking for a time again, and I didn't have to raise my head to 
wonder what had distracted him, for the wet sounds of a working mouth and smacking 
lips could be heard, even above the sounds of tongues in my own ears.  Still, I caught 
every word, as he tossed them to me. 
"Then, one bright, sunny morning, for no reason whatever, I called him forth from 
his dungeon, had him bathed and properly coifed for his appearance before my court, 
much as I have done for you this day.  He came, when I called, like a dog that would 
fetch a leash.  He kept himself at my heel, groveling.  I lifted him up to stand before me, 
face to face, as none other could before their king, and I kissed him.  Full on the lips.  
Then I cut his throat." 
His last, deadly words brought me up short, and I pushed the girls away again, 
straightening.  "Just like that.  Wasn't it... messy." 
He laughed, and smoothed the fine, dark, straight hair of his companion, where 
she was working furiously in his lap with her face.  "Messy.  Again, you surprise me, 
John.  You do not show the expected emotion upon hearing my words." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
267 
I jerked my head away from those tongues and fingers again, making a point of it, 
this time.  "I don't know..."  I hedged, wondering just what to say to this man that I both 
believed and disbelieved in the same instant.  Rationally, he was a lunatic.  Yet this was 
not a place of rationality, I realized, and so I came to the conclusion that perhaps I was 
the lunatic.  "It just doesn't get me off, you know, all that talk of blood and guts.  I mean, 
I'd rather have a clean shirt and maybe go see a movie, or something." 
Joshua returned with a sigh through perfectly white, tightly clenched teeth.  "Yet 
you have stood your field fast, John, many times over again.  They handed you a football 
this time.  In another time, had they handed you a spear or a sword, say, you might have 
run just as far with it, perhaps farther.  For combat has a way of building a man up within 
himself, or of crushing him flat.  I think you know it.  I know you feel it.  I have seen its 
evidence in you.  In your actions, I mean to say." 
I grimaced, and moved to the edge of my seat to avoid those grasping claws and 
sucking maws of intense pleasure.  "What the fuck is that supposed to mean." 
His glance at me was sharp and stern.  He removed the girl from his lap harshly.  
"Dare you speak to me so.  Have you not heard my words.  Or is it that you do not 
believe." 
"Cannot believe," I sighed.  "Look, Josh-" 
"Joshua.  You are too familiar." 

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268 
"Whatever.  Joshua, it's just too much for my little pea brain, I guess.  You're 
saying you've lived a couple thousand years, at least, and that you've participated in just 
about every major conflict in every era from then until now, and you're saying you love 
nothing so much as you love killing.  So I say, okay, it could happen in this place.  
Maybe you're right, and I'm the fucking nut.  All I know is, I can't feel impressed by it.  
Not much.  Not really.  So what.  What does it have to do with me.  Why should I care." 
He seemed to have expected this, and returned almost immediately.  "Earlier, I 
spoke of an absence of time and of a peasant that once had from me all the wonders of a 
lifetime." 
"Then had his throat cut for it," I inserted quickly, merely to vex him. 
Waggling a finger, he tacked, "Not for my reward of him, but for his betrayal of 
me.  Still, if it had not been I, it should have been another.  He was a fool, John, not 
because he drew his army nigh to my capitol keep.  No, John, he was a fool because he 
longed for a thing that he should never have.  Yet I gave it to him happily, and him 
believing it a favor, though the worst thing one man may offer another is oftentimes 
exactly that which the other craves." 
"So I'm the peasant come before your court," I drawled, "And immortality is the 
kingdom you would convey.  Right." 
Again came his smile of even, white teeth, which was the show of fangs on the 
face of a most vicious predator come to devour me.  "You might have allowed me the 
drama of its proper presentation." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
269 
"Look, not everybody lives forever, Joshua.  I'm ageing, even as we speak, though 
I don't know about you.  I noticed it's dark outside now.  I hate nighttime in this place, it 
really creeps me out.  You can see why I'm anxious to figure this all out and get back to 
my room." 
"Very well," he parried stiffly.  "You have defined the matter roughly enough.  
Let us continue with the trade." 
"Yeah," I agreed sagely, "There's only one part missing.  What do I have to do." 
"Play." 
I groaned and cursed.  "Somehow, I knew you were going to say that!  Play what.  
What sort of game is it." 
"A game of lives and deaths, John.  Have you an interest." 
We shared each the other's stare for a time.  He seemed to be serious, and I 
decided he was.  Why not.  What else had I expected, I admonished myself.  At the same 
time, I realized he was seeing within my gaze exactly what he had expected to see.  
While he was a towering question before me, I remained a known, and insubstantial, 
quantity before him. 
"How can I be interested in nothing.  I don't have a clue what you're on about." 
Making a dismissive gesture with his hand, he hastened to clarify.  "I correspond 
with the gatekeeper of your village often," he declared, as if he were confessing to me a 
slightly kept secret, "It is one of the more curious garden spots to be found on this 
glorious planet, as a unique sort of... condition exists there." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
270 
"I hadn't guessed," came my droll retort.  I was silently wondering why he was 
referring to the place as though it were halfway around the world.  We hadn't come so far.  
Had we. 
"A curious sort of people inhabit it," he continued, apparently uninterrupted, 
though I often heard gasps from the far corners of the room each time I interjected.  "I 
think, because a curious sort of people find their way to it and stay.  You have made 
friends in that place," he stated simply, and I wondered how he defined the word, "In 
such a short time.  Or should I say, John, that others have made a friend of you.  I know.  
I have watched from the first moment your gatekeeper made me aware of you." 
"My gatekeeper." 
"She that holds the power of your door, that it should swing within or without.  
None enter into that place without her hand having turned the latch.  None leave, except 
via the same method, though some think themselves clever in the keeping of maps."  He 
chuckled.  "Still a child within a sandbox will invariably build castles of the stuff, will it 
not." 
"Or bridges.  I always built bridges with mine." 

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271 
"Yes.  Well," he sputtered, "It is too long ago to remember for me.  I merely point 
out that they come to stay, and play at leaving.  Invariably conflicted, the denizens of that 
sad township are doomed to their eternal dissatisfaction by their very natures.  Yet they 
would believe themselves capable of resolving their conflicts, even if doing so must come 
as a figment of their imagination."  Smoothing his ruffled finery, he settled into the couch 
and gloated.  "I find it amusing to watch them working so diligently at nothing.  Funny, is 
it not, that they should spend so much time idle in your world, where time counts, when 
they shall have all of eternity in this to move not at all.  They are... ants, you see, on an 
anthill, ever furiously working toward an unknown, unseen end, indeed, toward an end 
that is but a figment.  For there is no bottom to an empty stomach, John, nor an end to 
breathing, except that it come as the end of that entire world, and the beginning of 
another. 
"Few of them have a chance to lay their tiny feet upon the world, John, with the 
power to roll it around another way.  Few of them climb to the top of their little hill in the 
dust to cast their gazes out to the horizon and question their pathetic fates or dream of far 
places. 
"Few, such as you, John, climb from their lot in that world.  Few extend 
themselves beyond the framework of their destiny.  Yet, you would.  That, more than 
anything else you have ever done, sets you apart from the others." 
I refused to be flattered.  "Though I'm still an ant.  An insect." 
"Well, what of it.  Where is the shame in being an insect.  Everything has its 
noble place.  Yet, I do not think of you as such, John.  Yours was a strange, new path for 
our kind to take, yet you had no choice in the course of it.  Not truly." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
272 
"Our kind." 
"Oh, do not deny we are brothers of the same fierce heart, John!  As I have said, 
this time they handed you a football.  I often wonder if you were fortunate or unfortunate 
in the run of it.  From the beginning to the end, it was a wonder, but, as it ever must, you 
ended all in blood, did you not.  Your final step was the only proper step of your life, I 
think. 
"For your life was barren of what it might have held.  Therefore, I wonder if you 
were fortunate or unfortunate in the timing of it all.  I wonder if a time of war might have 
better served you during your life, which might have forced into your hand a weapon, 
rather than a silly child's play thing. 
"Game after game, however, I imagine it was combat to you.  I imagine that, 
within your mind, all your fallen enemies lay slain at your feet when it was finished.  
Blood shed in your pristine arenas, John, even if it flowed as a river solely within your 
own thoughts. 
"I have known many of your kind in my times on Earth.  I have named you my 
lieutenant, and then my captain, and, at times, my general.  For your kind, our kind, John, 
can never be satisfied except when in a stretch for something we should not have, except 
in the course of reaching for something we should not possess.  For you, fortunately or 
perhaps unfortunately, they were days of bloodless conquests and defeats, though they 
were conquests and defeats, nonetheless. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
273 
"Regardless, it was not enough.  The full quantity of all your glory would not 
suffice or satiate.  How could it.  You were primed to cross lines of martial death, John, 
not those silly children's lines drawn in the sandbox.  I know.  I know."  He placated with 
an upraised palm, though I had not protested.  "It was all you had, therefore, it was the 
best you could do. 
"Still, I think it prudent to suppose you might have done much better at the 
command of a U-boat or a Tiger tank, eh.  Or wielding a brigade of cavalry about the 
field.  A hundred, a thousand, a million men working together at your command rather 
than the paltry eleven that you moved about during your insignificant games.  Imagine 
it!" 
Again, I shrugged, feigning a coolness I had long forgotten.  "Like I told you, the 
blood and guts don't get me off the way it does for you." 
"Which is the unfortunate side of it, I think.  You say that today, but you might 
not have said the same thing thirty years ago, crouched in the leafy kill zones of Viet 
Nam, eh.  Now THERE was a fight! Ten thousand days of war there.  Ten thousand days 
is a long time to bleed, John.  Ten thousand days is a long time to run wild and free 
through careless lands of murder. 
"So I come to our business at hand.  As you say, we have started with what I 
want.  I want you to play.  I want you to go back and play, John, but not a childish game 
of balls and of sand boxes!  I want you to return and finish the game you started so many 
days past.  It is your own game, John, and I want you to play it.  All the way to the 
bloody end." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
274 
"I see."  I breathed deeply and exhaled slowly.  "The bloodier the better, I 
suppose."  He made a dismissive motion with his chin.  "But, the problem is, Josh," I 
stressed the familiarity, "That's the one thing I DON'T want to do.  So you're kind of shit 
out of luck, the way I see it." 
"The way you see it and what you want," he enthused menacingly, his smile gone 
and his countenance fallen hatefully flat, once more, "Have nothing whatever to do with 
it, I assure you.  You, John, dearest John, dance as a marionette from my fingers, and 
have so danced for some time." 
"Bullshit," I spat.  Maybe the guy really was the lunatic in this discussion, after 
all.  "No fucking way." 
"As you would have it," he sighed wearily, as though he were explaining 
discipline to a small child.  "Let me stab this thing directly in the heart by simply pointing 
out that it ended my way, John, and not the other way around." 
I started my mouth open to speak, and stopped.  Intending to demand the 
definition of his 'way' of it, as opposed to the other, I suddenly realized what his words 
meant.  I saw him in a whole new light that had nothing at all to do with the purple 
highlight of the moon's blue glow, where it was filtered through the crimson glass of the 
ceiling. 
I gushed, "What's in it for me.  It's a pay for play proposition, isn't it.  So what's 
in it for me." 
"You mean beyond the comforts of a wealth of time that is fixed eternity." 
"Especially beyond that." 
"Well, perhaps you would settle for... HER." 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
275 
I understood him at once, then.  Her.  His alter ego, I considered.  His sister.  His 
daughter, perhaps.  Her.  My stomach rolled. 
Sickeningly, I longed.  Disgustingly, I yearned, and hated what I wanted, and 
wanted what I hated. 
"Forever," he added with a whisper that seemed to bleed endlessly through my 
ears. 
For the first time that night, I began listening, earnestly listening to what he would 
say, and what he would have of me.  For the first time in years, I licked my lips to 
consider the return of the one thing in the entire world that could repair me, make me 
whole.  As an addict in desperate need of his drug, I listened carefully.  To plot and plan 
how I should come to lay my hands once more upon her.  To have her again, I burned, in 
some way, after some fashion, however bizarre or corrupt. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
276 

 

R 

Rusted Trestles 

I awoke to find myself in bed at the hotel.  It was morning.  Nothing had, 
apparently, happened, save that I had slept and dreamt strangely. 
I wondered at the line that divided reality from dreams, and found it difficult to 
define.  Waking and sleeping, falling and rising, all seemed the same motion, and the 
absolute direction of it appeared to be irrelevant. 
Until I dressed and descended the stairs to find my dark hostess awaiting my 
presence at the foot of the risers.  Her face wore a pensive mask.  Her eyes shone with 
worry.  They betrayed the reality, and I knew I had been there, really been there. 
I stopped on the third step, and stared down on her.  “I’m checking out,” I droned 
flatly. 
“Out.” she wondered, shocked, but not surprised.  “Where to.” 
“Across the bridge.  I have business.” 
“Across the bridge.”  It was a statement, not a question.  She wheeled on her toe 
to follow me with her eyes, as I descended finally to the floor and swept past her to find 
my seat at the breakfast table. 

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Stephen Huff 
277 
All eyes were fixed upon me, as I pulled up a chair at the head of the table.  Wide.  
Questioning.  Fearful.  They watched me, I thought, as though I were Christ come to His 
last supper.  Or the devil, more likely, come to crudely feed from the gory trough of 
savagery. 
Francis was on time, for once, I noticed, or perhaps I was late.  I decided it didn’t 
matter. 
“Francis,” I croaked.  “You’ll come with us, and one other.”  I turned to that 
shadow of a woman, her eyes so dark that they reminded me of another’s, darker.  “And 
you, of course.” 
She nodded, and her face was pale.  She would come.  Good.  I had wondered 
what she might say or do when I offered. 
“And the other.” wondered Francis. 
I remained silent for a moment, considering how it should be said.  “The little girl 
with the pigtails.” 
They gasped.  Vincent belched, “Why not one of us.  Or two.  Or three, for that 
matter.”  Henry Lee was quick at the big man’s shoulder to ease him back into his seat 
and reason with the same gesture. 
I turned a cold, serious eye on them all, even as I filled my plate.  One by one, 
save for the woman and Francis, they all turned away.  Finally, I asked quietly, “Would 
you really come, if I asked.” 
Vincent said nothing, but stood abruptly from the table, and left the house.  One 
by one, all but my new companions followed. 

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278 
“The little girl, Johnny.” queried Francis sickly, when we were alone.  “Are you 
sure.  I mean, she really freaks me out, man.” 
She said nothing, but was content to merely watch with her large, liquid brown 
eyes that spoke of endless fields of freshly tilled rows, ready for planting.  I could not 
long gaze into them without thinking of Iowa and far, far away places. 
“What about the old man.” he pressed.  Then he seemed to correct himself, “Yeah, I 
guess we’re better off without that one.” 
I shrugged.  “He doesn’t need us to make his way there and back.  He has... business 
there from time to time, too.” 
“Will we return.” 
“I don’t know what you’re going to do, Francis,” I stated seriously around a mouthful of 
toast and eggs.  “I’m just carrying you past the bridge.  After that, you make your own way.  
Unless you want to stay here with the others, of course.” 
“No, no, no,” he returned quickly, showing the palms of his hand to stop the insanity.  
“That’s fine.  Just fine with me.”  He jumped up suddenly, tipping his chair back to the floor with 
a loud crash.  I grimaced and swallowed a gulp of icy water.  “I better get my stuff!” he shouted, 
and was out of the room, and halfway up the stairs before something seemed to catch him up 
short. 
“Hey,” he started, some thought having only just occurred to him.  “Wait a minute.  
That’s four.  Two up front and two in the back...”  he leaned over to get a look at me beneath the 
ceiling, and blanched when he caught my eye.  Mumbling incoherently, he mounted the stairs 
with much less enthusiasm. 
“Why that one.” she asked finally. 

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279 
I shrugged.  “It’s a favor.  I don’t like it any more than you do, but she’s going.  That’s 
the end of it.” 
“I see.  And Francis.” 
Again, I shrugged.  “He thinks he wants it.” 
“And me.” 
I turned to her sharply.  Was she acting or being sincere.  “I think you know the answer 
to that question.” 
“I remind you of someone, don’t I.” she sighed.  “I can tell.   I guess it’s enough.  For 
now.” 
“Great.  Get your shit together.  We’re leaving soon.” 
She mocked, “I have no ‘shit’ to gather.  Nothing I want to keep, anyway.” 
We shared our gazes, and I recognized myself within her.  “Just what you’re wearing and 
carrying, right.” 
She shrugged, and gathered the breakfast dishes, though I wondered why she bothered.  
“What about this place.” I wondered aloud, before stuffing my mouth full again. 
“Another will come to take my place, as I took the place of the one before me.  It’s the 
way of such things.” 
“Come.” I asked, not really caring for the answer.  “From where.” 
“Out there.  Somewhere.  For whatever reason.  In whatever way.  I don’t try to guess at 
the why of it all, or wonder how.” 
“Sounds dangerously passive to me,” I returned, eating. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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280 
“Perhaps.  Once,” she sighed, apparently realizing her work was done here.  She dropped 
the plates she had gathered into a pile, and pulled up a chair at the corner beside me.  “Once, 
while playing in an early summer rain storm, I caught a lady-bug.  She was yellow, you know, 
which was why I caught her, since I had only seen red ones before then.  For a time, a short time 
in my life I suppose and an eternity in hers, I held her and admired her.  She was so beautiful.  So 
different.” 
“Then.” I prodded, gulping tepid coffee. 
“Then, I tossed her into the little stream of water running in the gutter along the curb.”  
Her eyes found mine, and I saw there the curiosity of a feline that shines in the eyes of all 
women from time to time.  “How it swam.  How it struggled to be free of the raging river that 
would drown it.  I remember how I hoped it would find its way to the edge and get free on its 
own.  It was a vain struggle, and I wouldn’t stoop to help.  She was swept into the drain.” 
I chewed the last bite of my breakfast and finished my coffee, my eyes never leaving 
hers.  “You’re saying it does no good whatever to swim, since it’s the same ending, one way or 
the other.” 
“That, but more.  You can’t forget I tossed her into the stream, didn’t I.  But for me, she 
might have lived another day.  Once dropped into the waters, however, her fate was sealed.” 
“I wonder who tossed US into our gutter, then.”  It was Francis, returned to the foot of 
the stair, waiting near the door with a small bundle beneath his left arm.  “I’m all for swimming 
like hell, anyway!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
281 
I grunted, and pushed away from the table, dabbing the corner of my mouth with a napkin 
and tossing it onto my empty plate.  “What else can you do, short of suicide.” 
They followed me out the front door, and down the front steps, then across the lawn to 
my car.  They climbed inside with me without speaking, Francis in the back seat opposite me, 
and her at my side.  With a silent glance and a soft, enigmatic smile from her, I started the old 
Datsun, and let the brake down. 
With a rough jerk of its gear lever, the car started down the street.  We rounded the corner 
and drove along the run-down avenue to that same, familiar stop sign, which guarded the end of 
all roads to its right, and the way home to its left.  A small figure stood alongside it, bright 
yellow as the morning sun that could not be seen for the forest canopy, pigtails dangling from the 
horned corners of her head. 
Francis groaned sickly, and smashed himself into the deepest corner of the backseat.  
When I stopped at the intersection, she crossed the street, smiling with a row of glistening fangs. 
“Hey, mister,” she called softly, rolling her bicycle to my door.  “Can you fix my bike.” 
After a moment of silent debate, and much consideration of Joshua’s dark promises and 
brilliant threats of punishment, I nodded my head toward the rear hatch, which I popped open 
with the toss of a lever.  “Sure, kid.  Francis, help her get that thing into the car.” 
I grinned to see him go without a word or a grumble.  Roughly, he worked it in through 
the hatch, which he slammed shut with too much force. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
282 
Then both he and the girl climbed into the rear seat to sit opposite each other.  A cat and a 
dog forced into the same small box, I thought, each found a wilderness of space in the corners of 
the cramped seat, and stayed there, eyeing the other suspiciously. 
“Hot damn!” I shouted suddenly, spinning the wheel of the Datsun hard left, starting at 
least a few of my passengers from their seats, “We make a motley crew!  If my old daddy had 
seen us,” I gushed, shifting from first to second, “He’d declare the carnival was in town.” 
Francis pouted.  “With some of the company you keep, Johnny, I don’t think that does 
carnival folk any credit at all!” 
The little girl in the bright yellow Easter Sunday dress hissed at her companion, and stuck 
out her little pink tongue.  I caught it in the rearview, part of it at least, and it seemed to me, 
when I turned my head to catch her from the corner of my eye, that a black, nasty, insect-like 
thing was sitting there in her place.  Then, no, a second glance told it me it was a trick of the 
light. 
Yeah, right, I reassured myself.  A trick of the light. 
“So, where are we going.” queried the little girl thing.  I felt my shoulders hunch to hear 
her voice, an instinctive shrinking that is the wince of a beaten cur at the sight or sound of its 
abusive master. 
Before I could respond, Francis was there with, “To hell, if we don’t change our ways!” 
We all laughed.  It was a disturbing, dark, familiar laughter, that spoke of the black sins 
we shared and of the unwholesome lusts that drove us.  We seemed a lovely bunch of henchmen, 
then, our hands upon the rope, chuckling to consider the strangle of a neck, the snap of a spine.  

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Stephen Huff 
283 
For a mad moment, I felt a sense of companionship come over me, the likes of which I had not 
known since my glory days on the high school football field.  I felt, and was perhaps not wrong 
in feeling, that we might have stormed the world at that moment, the four of us that harbored so 
many mysterious hatreds within our breasts. 
We that were the beaten, refused, turned-out, cast off rubbish of the world.  We that had, 
like dust bunnies come together in a dark space, found our way to each other individually or as 
one, all in the course of time.  Time that was the material of jokes for some that name themselves 
demigod, and time that was, for those that remained merely mortal, all the wealth, all the power, 
all the surety of the world.  Time that was, indeed, for those of us with hearts to beat, every beat 
of it, measured as the constant working of a mechanism that must one day fail. 
Even such as we, that coveted nothing so much as we coveted our own individual 
depravities, even we that had come so far to elude the unhappy rewards of our fell labors, even 
we must know the end.  I wondered in that moment, as the sense of companionship faded to be 
replaced by the acid burn of self-loathing, if they all felt the same thing.  I wondered, only 
briefly, if they, too, felt how each turn of those wheels upon that pavement was nothing more 
than further footfalls on the final path to an inevitable end. 
An end more certain now than ever, I considered, since we were destined to return to the 
nefarious fates we had, individually, escaped and that awaited us on the far side of that looming 
bridge. 
We all tensed to see it.  We had all, apparently, made this vain journey before.  None of 
us truly believed in the possibilities of freedom.  Not at the moment.  Not until we were across 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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284 
those rusted trestles and well beyond without once more coming to rest at the final stop sign that 
guarded the ultimate end of all roads. 
We topped a familiar hill.  A familiar, dilapidated structure came into view.  Rather than 
roaring past, I slowed, and wheeled left off the road onto the dirt apron that was the ‘Town 
Store’s parking lot. 
“Why are we stopping here, Johnny.” wondered Francis. 
“I have some deliveries to make.  Get out.  All of you.”  I grunted, as I popped open my 
door and climbed free of the Datsun’s interior.  “You can help load.” 
The woman and Francis obliged me.  I was grateful to see the little girl thing remain 
seated, as if deserving of a royal sort of treatment. 
Mounting the steps, we were greeted at the top by the screech of the rusted spring of the 
screen door.  The gaunt old man stood there, sucking on a home-rolled cigarette. 
“A-ye-up,” he drawled upon seeing us all together.  “I figured as much.  Well, come on 
in, then.  I guess it’s business with Bonnie you’ll be having, and time for me to head into town.” 
He edged out onto the porch to make room for the others, and seemed to linger in a manner that 
begged my attention.  I stayed with him a moment, and he urgently pressed something into my 
hand.  It was a ring concealed within a posted envelope; I felt the loop of it through the thick 
paper.  Its metal was warm, as if it had just slipped free of his finger.  “This is that thing I told 
you about earlier, what you got to deliver for me down to my sister in Dallas, Texas.”  He got a 
grip on my hand with both his own hands, and forced it into a fist around the signet.  Then he 
forced the fist into my own pants pocket. 

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285 
“Your part of it,” he hissed urgently, “Is just this.”  He forced an old .45 caliber semi-
automatic pistol into my hands.  Wrapped in a well-worn shoulder holster that held spare clips, 
the bullets they contained shone in the dappled sun.  “It’s the thing you’ll need most, and the 
thing that only I can provide.  Take it,” he whispered fiercely, heading for the steps.  “Keep it 
hid.  You’ll know when to put it on and when to put it to use.” 
At the bottom of the steps, he paused on his way to his ancient Ford.  “I hope you won’t 
take it personal, when I say I hope to never see you again, Johnny Bullet.  It’s a one way trip this 
time, for sure.” 
“Yeah, okay,” I breathed softly.  He didn’t have to add that last part, I thought blackly, 
tucking the holstered weapon away in the hem of my pants, pulling my shirt down over it. 
As I was about to push my way inside the store, the darkling woman and Francis pushed 
past me instead, their arms straining with the burden of their cargo.  Francis groaned and cursed, 
while she was silent in her suffering.  They dutifully loaded the Datsun, piling their burlap sacks 
in about the little girl’s bicycle wherever they could make room. 
When I turned to let the door slam shut, Bonnie was standing in the doorway, her ever 
present scowl once more hatefully fixed on me.  “Fucking punk kid,” she hissed.  “God damned 
cheese sandwiches.” 
I smiled, despite her.  “Is that it.” 
She growled, “What, you want more.  It’s never enough, is it.  Well, let me tell you 
something, you little bastard,” she advanced a step, and I instinctively retreated.  “You’re no 

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better nor badder than any of the rest that come through.  You’re just a fucking punk kid.  Eye 
candy.  That’s all.” 
“You said that already,” I returned, making my way to the steps.  “What’s in the sacks.” I 
tossed over my shoulder, though I didn’t much care and held no hope of hearing the truth. 
“Fuck you,” she returned stiffly.  “It’s none of your damned business, any more than it is 
mine.  It’s what you need.  It’s what you come for.  It’s what you get.  I don’t make the shit, I 
just shovel it!” 
“Okay,” I offered glibly, yanking open my door and climbing inside the stuffed Datsun 
with the others, “And fuck you, too, lady!” 
They laughed with me, as I spun us around and back onto the blacktop.  We weren’t 
coming back, that laughter said, and there seemed to be no guessing to it, any longer.  Francis, at 
least, knew enough about Bonnie and her mysterious packages to guess that they were not post-
marked for this side of the bridge, that they were instead bound for the far side of the river, with 
us. 
They all, apparently, so longed to escape.  While I was content to remain.  I might have 
stayed forever, I thought, if not for goading hopes of her.  She was the carrot before me, and the 
stick behind.  She was the direction of my feet, the focus of my vision, the source of all my 
considerations. 
As she was, once more, within my reach.  I had thought it never to be again, but it was 
true.   It must be true.  I forced myself to believe it was the truth. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
287 
When we started across the ancient span, I gritted my teeth and clenched the Datsun’s 
wheel with white knuckles.  Through the center and across the other side we drove, but none 
could say if it was the far side or the near side, again, until we were several miles further down 
the road, and no sign of the Town Store to be seen. 
We exchanged happy faces, including the little girl thing, and, for a brief moment, the 
sun shone down up on us.  I checked my gauges.  Half a tank, a couple hundred miles, I thought.  
A few hours of freedom.   Not much, I considered, but enough.  It would have to be enough. 
“So,” enthused Francis from the backseat, apparently forgetting his frightful companion 
for the moment.  He leaned forward between the front seats, inserting his head between mine and 
hers.  “Where to now, Johnny.” 
I was on the verge of making a response, when I instead hissed, “Son of a bitch!”  They 
turned to follow my gaze and see the old crow standing to one side of the blacktop. 
He flapped his arms and the many layers of black clothing that they gathered, and I 
noticed he was cackling madly as we passed.   He pointed a familiar, accusatory finger, slapped 
his knee, and collapsed to the ground with the weight of his mirth. 
The Datsun rushed past to leave him rolling in the dust.  Francis turned to trace the old 
man’s passage along the roadside.  “What’s he doing out here, do you think.” 
“An errand boy,” I offered, “Running his errands.” 
“The place smells better already!” brayed Francis, easing back to his seat, and seeming to 
remember the little girl that was his mate.  He fidgeted for a time. 

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288 
For a time, we drove along in silence.  Until Francis called meekly, “Hey, Johnny.”  I 
ignored him.  I knew what he was going to say.  “Johnny, pull over, won’t you.” 
I adjusted my rearview mirror to see him in it.  My sharp glance was my question. 
“Yeah, just pull over anywhere.  Right here is good.  I want to get out.” 
“Out, kid.” 
“I think I’ll walk it from here.” 
Shrugging, I eased to a stop on the shoulder of the lonely highway, and leaned forward in 
my seat to allow him out behind me.  He slammed the door shut again, and leaned through my 
window.  “It’s not that I don’t want to go with you guys,” he offered awkwardly.  “It’s just...” 
“I know,” I returned to placate him.  “It’s a long walk, and a long way.  Sometimes, it’s 
just too damned far.” 
“Yeah, I guess.”  He leaned back, and I shifted into first.  “Be careful, Johnny.  And 
thanks.  Thanks for being my... friend.” 
I smiled.  “Sure, kid.” 
We left him there, standing near the center line.  He watched us fade into the distance, 
and I thought it was his back I saw, when we topped a final hilltop some miles away.  He was 
walking in the opposite direction.  Back into town. 
She had seen it, too.  Shaking her head, she sighed, “Fool.” 
The little girl thing giggled.  “He was too little to play, anyway.  Besides,” she sneered, 
“He wasn’t very nice.” 
“Nice.” I demanded of her.  “What the hell do you know about ‘nice’.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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289 
“Johnny,” admonished the dark one. 
It was too late.  “Nice,” replied pigtails, “Is a bright yellow dress on a bright Sunday 
morning!  Nice is wild flowers by the bunches!  Nice is ice cream when it’s hot, and cocoa when 
it’s freezing!  Nice,” she gushed, bouncing up and down childishly in her seat, “Is being on this 
side of that fucking bridge!” 
“I told you before,” I chided, half-heartedly.  “Little girls should watch their mouths!” 
“Whatever for.” she wondered genuinely. 
“Because,” I hedged, “It spoils your facade.  It exposes you.  Frankly, if I have to see 
you, I prefer to see the little girl.” 
She smiled and was still.  Her eyes fixed on mine through the mirror, I watched while 
those hideous orbs went black from corner to corner, blotting out the whites.  Her smile 
lengthened and was toothier than any human mug should ever be.  It came in an instant, this 
transformation, and was gone again. 
So quickly that it might have been a trick of the light, MUST have been a trick of the 
light.  I shook my head to clear it, and returned my gaze to the road before us, just in time to 
wheel left to avoid the shoulder.  My heart was racing. 
I had rarely known it since childhood, since that day on the banks of the Saline River 
with my father, my step-father I mean, but I felt it now.  Fear, which came as the grip of an icy 
hand upon the struggle of my heart, to chill it and send it into a nervous stutter. 
She was the little pink girl in the bright yellow dress again, and turned her gaze out the 
window, releasing me.  “What you want.  What you need.  What you deserve,” she scoffed, the 

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age of her tone ancient and incongruously sounding from her apparently youthful mouth.  “Has 
absolutely nothing to do with anything whatever, Johnny Bullet.” 
“I’ve heard that before.” 
“Maybe, someday, you’ll believe it.” 
“I don’t think so.”  I breathed deeply through my nostrils, and was grateful to note the 
absence of that brooding forest’s reek.  “I’ve had nothing so much from the world as I have had 
its denials.  Its refusals.  Its rules.  Its lines not to be crossed, which I have repeatedly crossed.  I 
have too many times done the impossible to believe in the impossible any longer.  I don’t care 
what you, or your daddy, have to say about it.” 
She frowned to hear my mention of Joshua.  It was a pleasant enough name, but the ideal 
of the man behind it was an abomination, even to her ears, apparently. 
“He’s not my daddy.” 
“Yet, you know him.” 
She twiddled her pigtails and was demure.  “Maybe...” 
“You know you’re here because he wants you to be here.” 
“He said he would find somebody to fix my bike.” 
“When it’s fixed.  What then.” 
Her smile told all.  It was not the smile of a sweet young girl.  It was the leer of a 
lecherous fiend that would consider depravity with a fond familiarity. 
“Then.” she was up and down in her seat again, acting the child.  “Then I go for a r-i-i-i-
i-i-i-de!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
291 
I exchanged a concerned glance with the dark one.  We were both wondering, I knew, 
what sort of ride it would be, and to where.   When she glanced away to think of some 
mysterious something that she did not want to betray with her eyes, I realized we were all bound 
for an unwholesome voyage into the black unknown.  We were all bound individually to our 
individual missions, which were not borne of goodness but which could only prosper further 
evils in the world beyond the river. 
How had it come to this, I wondered briefly.  From the endless rows of Iowan corn fields 
to this hateful two lane.  From the company of my loving mother and the nurture of innocence, to 
this crew of fiends and the keeping of corruption.  How had such evil taken root within my 
heart.  How had it prospered out of all control.  Just days, I thought, from there to here.  Years.  
A measure of time.  A cycle of springs and autumns that had born the fruits of selfish labors. 
I was coming to believe that nothing in it had been random.  Nothing was chance.  
Nothing was truly unknown or left undone.  I was coming to believe that I was me from the 
beginning to the end, always and from the first moment.  Having been born, I was in the same 
instance condemned to death.  Both were halves of the same promise, of the same gift or curse, I 
considered, therefore neither could be without the other.  Just as the hour and the day of the start 
of it was known and fixed in time, so was the end of it allotted its own hour and date.  What was 
the hour.  What was the date. 

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Stephen Huff 
292 
Naturally, I could not guess, but I could wonder at the course of it.  I could 
attempt to understand it from the perspective of my present position within it.   
Nonetheless, it was a canvas I had painted and re-painted time and again.  It was a 
wearying struggle, and I was exhausted from it.  I had grown bored with the keeping of 
the scene, as it was never perfect and so could never be finished. 
Still, it was a curiosity, the course of it, the destiny of it, the way of it.  I refused 
to rework it, and promised myself that I never would again.  Yet I saw no harm in 
reviewing it as I last left it.  I saw no damage to be done by my admiration of it, for good 
or ill. 
What was done, was finished and permanent, never to be expunged.  What was to 
come, was to come, and could no more be denied its coming than a child could deny its 
own birth.  With the coming of it, the ending of it. 
So I felt no fear when my foot descended on the accelerator to hasten the finish.  I 
was eager for it, because I was powerless within it.  I was a ladybug, tossed into a gutter.  
My doom... OUR doom... awaited. 

 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
293 

 

S 

Sheol 

I was thirteen years old when my father, my step-father I mean, turned thirty 
three.  My mother found it strange that I insisted on a party.  We each bought him a gift, 
and he had a few of his better behaved drinking buddies over to polish off a keg, which 
was my mother’s present to him. 
Mine was a twelve gauge semi-automatic shotgun, and five boxes of shells.  It 
was of a particular brand and style, designed specifically for hunting small game, that had 
a relatively short barrel and a plastic stock.  Which I thought, combined, would make it 
easy for him to put his thumb against the trigger and the muzzle in his mouth. 
He beamed over it all afternoon, tossing my hair playfully from time to time.  He 
boasted of his long standing ‘friendship’ and ‘kinship’ with his ‘son’, whom he had 
raised to be a top notch student and a rising star in the junior league football team.  He 
hefted it often to his shoulder to sight its bead upon this person or another, frightening 
them out of their chairs or out of the room, altogether.  He racked shells without firing, 
and he fired without racking shells. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
294 
Somebody, I was sure, was going to end up dead before the night was finished.  
Perhaps he, too, sensed it somehow, for he became sullen early in the evening, and 
ordered everybody home before sundown.   He finished the keg by himself. 
After he had passed out in the bedroom, my mother sat on the couch, having 
cleaned up his filth yet again, and patted the empty space beside her, motioning me to be 
seated.  I obliged her, and knew what was coming. 
“Why, John.” she asked, puzzled, exasperated, frightened.  “Why that... particular 
gift, John.  Where did you get the money.” 
“I bought it with my hay-baling money from the summer,” I answered truthfully, 
sitting stiffly beside her.  After so many years, she had become less a part of myself than 
she was a part of him, which, at times, counted her among my most detested enemies.  As 
she was that evening. 
I had learned to recognize it in her, by then, which side she chose to defend at any 
given moment.  It was him or me.  She could rarely choose both, and, much to my own 
agony and heartache, I had experienced her consistent preference for him.  She turned a 
blind eye open upon his misdeeds, when he required it.  She vouched safe his lies when it 
was an alibi he required.  She stood fast his abuses of me, as she would a poisonous god, 
and sanctified his every action with justifications beyond reason, motivations above 
ridicule, aspirations that were her thin disguise, I decided, for her very clear and thorough 
understanding of him.  She knew him.  She knew him well. 
She knew where he went, what he did, when he did it, and with whom.  When I 
realized this much of it, the rest came easily.  She had known the entire time, I was 
certain.  She had known what he was doing to me, and she kept silent.  Worse, I had 

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heard them argue from time to time, and I understood that it was a source of power that 
she had over him.  Leave her, she threatened, and she would tell.  Invariably, a slap 
would come as her reply, but he never left. 
So I bought him the twelve gauge, spending every penny I had, and some I had borrowed 
from the old farmer that let me drive his tractor and bale his hay of an autumn.  With its five 
boxes of shells. 
‘Why.’ she had asked.  Sometimes, I couldn’t separate my thoughts from my words, and 
I could not be certain if she wanted to know why I had gifted him with the weapon, or why I had 
included the five boxes of shells. 
“One,” I answered, offering her what I wanted to hear, less what she wanted to know.  I 
said it, because I wanted her to remember that I said it.  I wanted to get a cold, frightened glance 
from her that was the comprehension of the intricacies of my plot.  “Is for next weekend.   He’ll 
take it out for sure, but it’s not the end of a pay period, so he won’t have much money.  They’ll 
go down to the bottoms, south of town, and I figure it’ll be one box.” 
“One box.” 
“Of shells, mother.  The second, will come during the week that follows.  He’ll shoot it 
off each night, I reckon, on his way home from work.  A headlight here, a stop sign there, that 
kind of thing.  Three and four will be the following weekend, when he’ll take his pay check and 
head for the fields to do some poaching.”  I stopped thinking, and smiled to consider the fifth, as 
I sat stiffly beside my mother. 
When I failed to finish the count, she prodded, “And the fifth.” 
“The fifth will be the last,” I returned softly.  “So he’ll keep it awhile.  Just long enough.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
296 
“Long enough for what.” she wondered aloud, and I could hear the worry in it.  She was 
afraid from the afternoon of him brandishing the thing, and I could see her nervousness in the 
corded flesh of her flexing fists at the thigh of her skirt. 
“Long enough to set me free, mother,” I offered simply.  I might have said, ‘us’, set ‘us’ 
free, but it was not to be.  Not now.  Not ever.  She had made her choice long ago, and it was too 
late to back pedal. 
Still, she was less a part of me than she was a part of him, and I hated her for it.  I hated 
her for her use of me.  Had I not stopped him, myself, he would not have stopped.  Not by her 
hand.  Not by any others.  In stopping it, I had diminished her before him, taken away some 
measure of her leverage in dealing with him, and she suffered for it.  She hated me for it, too, I 
think. 
When I thought of it later, I would see how the shotgun was a gift from me to all of us, 
for one reason or another.  For it would, indeed, after a fashion, set us all free.  Him.  Her.  Me. 
With a single flash of light.  Within the span of an instant. 
Much in the same way an eraser sweeps the board in a stroke to undo hours of letters and 
numbers, so time, the eternal reaper, comes at the end of the day to put paid to the sun, and so 
time comes at the verge of night to set forth the dark.  With but a single stroke, indeed, with the 
same stroke.  So much, from so little, I wondered.  A river bank that turns at the toss of a pebble. 
In the days that followed, I checked the boxes of shells, where I knew he kept them hid 
away.  To the last number, I had the count of it right.  Within two weeks, he was left with the 
one. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
297 
Day upon day, I watched the shells within that last box disappear in turn.  Day upon day, 
I scratched little ‘X’s into the squares of a calendar that I kept beneath the mattress of my bed. 
As a miser counting his folding bills, I thumbed that calendar from time to time, counting 
those tiny squares as money to add up the weeks, and the weeks to add up the months, and the 
months to add up my own redemption, counting ever from the present back to a particular 
afternoon.   For, upon that particular afternoon, I had retrieved the mail to find a letter addressed 
to him. 
It was from the financial firm that held the mortgage on his shitty little farm, a formal 
offer of settlement that I knew he had long lobbied and stooped and bowed and begged to obtain. 
It was, in fact, HIS freedom.  Which freedom, I felt, he did not deserve.  Strangely, as you may 
guess, the letter disappeared.  As did every one of its brothers and sisters that arrived in the 
weeks to follow, each with a deadline date nearing and nearing, then, finally, irrevocably past. 
He was homeless and property-less, and he was ignorantly unaware.  I sniggered myself 
to sleep night after night. 
I thought then, and think now, that a body can do anything with a mind, given the proper 
motivation and education.  I had decided that the ultimate sin lay in questions asked and 
unanswered.  At the time, I believed that every ‘why’ had its ‘because’, and that every ‘because’ 
should be known.  I believe this to be the case to this day, in fact, though I no longer believe the 
pursuit to be worthwhile.  For, indeed, there is a ‘because’ for every ‘why’, just as, I would 
eventually learn, there is a ‘why’ for every ‘because’, so it is a ladder of never-ending rungs.  

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
298 
Climb to the next only to encounter the one above, climb that one to discover yet another further 
along.  There was no saying where it might end, or if it would ever, in fact, end, at all. 
For, there is no hope found in endlessness, in eternity.  There is no hope in being a 
number one among billions.  There is no hope in walking, when everywhere is the same place 
and all directions lead there. 
Still, it is the nature of life to demand walking.  It is the character of existence to care not 
for the numbers of the multitude, when it is but a single belly to fill each night.  While patience is 
the only balm to sooth an eternity. 
Patience that is the death adder lying alongside a foot trail.  Waiting, breathlessly waiting.  
For how long, I am certain the serpent could not say, except to simply say, perhaps, long enough.  
Just long enough. 
For the proper circumstance must come in the course of time and it may fill a belly.  The 
proper circumstance, and time, was all and everything, I had learned. 
So I had provided the props for the play, and I had engineered the stage.  Then I simply 
waited for the golden flow of time to run its relentless course, the seconds like pennies rushing 
through my fingers, the days like dollars to stuff my thoughts with green and provide a soft, safe 
place to sleep for the first time in my short life. 
When the day arrived at last, I was eager for it.  My heart raced, when I heard him 
screaming about the posting of an eviction notice upon our door.  How he raged.   How he 
screamed.  How he stormed and stomped... first to the telephone, then to the closet… to fetch the 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
299 
shotgun.  I heard him rack a full magazine of shells, and I knew from my keeping of the count, 
that he had finished the fifth box. 
My mother came to fetch me from my room and hustle me out the back door.  Frightened 
by his terrible temper and his unhinged anger that would not be forced back into frame ever 
again, not by her, not by him, not by anybody, she fumbled with her keys, as we tumbled down 
the steps.  She forced me into cab of his truck, and pushed me across to the far side with an 
urgency I had never known from her, making room for her to climb behind the wheel and get her 
feet upon the pedals.  Without closing her door, she turned the key in the ignition, and sparked 
the old truck’s battered heart aflame. 
Just as she levered into first and spun the wheels in the gravel drive to start for the road, 
we heard the back screen door slam open with such force that it came off its spring, struck the 
side of the house, then came loose from its hinges.  Tottering to the top step, shotgun in hand, he 
bellowed, “Where are YOU going, you BITCH.!  YOU did this!  You did it on PURPOSE!  You 
and your little freak, there!” and he leveled the shotgun at her and pulled the trigger. 
The buckshot penetrated the cab easily, punching penny-sized holes in everything.  The 
windshield.  The dash.  Her, but not me. 
She screamed, yet forced the pickup past the house, down the drive, and hard right onto 
the farm-to-market run that was laid alongside his front gate.  Bleeding and crying and 
screaming, my mother drove faster than I thought was safe along that narrow two lane, bound for 
where I could not say, as town, and the only hospital for miles, lay in the opposite direction. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
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300 
Five minutes into her harried flight, she lost consciousness and crashed into a culvert at 
the shoulder of the road.  We came to rest in front of another tidy farm house that I recognized to 
be that of Mr. Drummond, for whom I had baled hay during the summer, and who had helped me 
to buy the shotgun that had delivered our ruin upon his front lawn that day.  He and his plump 
wife charged from their home to hear the noise of it. 
Mr. Drummond helped to extract my mother from her harness and the tangle of the 
truck’s interior, where she lay twitching and moaning.   While his wife had returned to the house 
to phone an ambulance and the sheriff. 
Soon, I heard sirens wailing in the distance, which sound, I often felt, seemed both a 
promise of rescue and a prophecy of doom in the same instance.  They came, but too late to save 
my mother.  Too late to save him.  Too late to save me. 
I started running along the road, as soon as I heard her gurgle her last breath.  The 
Drummonds shouted for me to stay, and their tones were naturally worried.  Except, they needn’t 
have minded.  I was in no danger.  I harbored no fears.  I was not depraved. 
I simply wanted to get back to his place... to watch the end of it all.  I had worked so 
hard, I thought, and it didn’t seem fair that I should miss the best part. 
I was a fast, long-winded runner.  My powerful legs, hurried as they were by the 
inevitability of time and of circumstance, fueled as they were by the growing rush of freedom’s 
flow throughout my being, ate up the distance, so the miles were come and gone without notice.  
I was delivered at our drive within moments it seemed, though it might have been an hour or 
more. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
301 
Several sheriff’s deputies had passed me along the way, and I found them stopped across 
the two lane in front of his farm.  The deputies were crouched behind the engine blocks of their 
cars, and my father, my step-father I mean, was nowhere to be seen. 
They wouldn’t let me get close, but I thought I was close enough.  I knew him well 
enough to guess what was going to happen, even before it happened. 
The deputies were apparently speaking with him via telephone, encouraging him to 
surrender, assuring him everything was going to be ‘okay’.  I almost laughed to hear it. 
Presently, they stopped speaking into their little telephones and huddled among 
themselves, shaking their heads, then nodding them, then shaking them again, occasionally 
glancing at their watches.  They were waiting for someone, I guessed.  I couldn’t know who it 
might be, but I had the feeling he or she would not arrive in time. 
No sooner had I suffered this thought, than he slammed open the front door and kicked 
this screen off its hinges, too.  As predicted, the shotgun barrel was in his mouth, his thumb on 
the trigger. 
As he descended the steps and walked across the front lawn to the drive, and along the 
drive toward the deputies, he was shouting incoherently around his mouthful of steel, even while 
the deputies were busy shouting their own confused warnings and half-hearted pleas for him to 
save himself.  I moved closer, taking advantage of the disarray, because I wanted to hear what he 
was saying.  Despite the muddle of the shotgun’s barrel and his own lunacy, I heard him 
shouting, “IS SHE DEAD.!  IS SHE DEAD.!  IS SHE DEAD.!” over and again. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
302 
They told him she was, and he stopped walking, then sank to his knees, sobbing.  I 
distinctly heard him utter, “I’m sorry,” just before the blast took off the top of his head and blew 
up his face like a horrid balloon. 
Bits of him sprayed everywhere, and a neat trail of brains made a line from the emptiness 
of his skull, stretching way back along the drive, into the green fields of his cursed farm.  It was 
a picture I never wanted to forget, because it was the only vision I could call forth before my 
eyes afterward to blot out the memories of our ‘camping’ trips together.  For this, more than 
anything else, I was grateful.  It was the ultimate gift from me to myself. 
It was relief from my most damaging wounds.  It was vengeance in the name of my most 
egregious injuries. 
“Jesus Christ,” I heard one of the deputies curse.  “Who let the kid through the 
barricades.  He saw the whole thing!” 
I felt a dozen arms and hands grip me all at once, protecting and shielding me from what 
they considered to be an abomination, and from what I regarded as my own Declaration of 
Independence, written in blood and brains on a dirt driveway.  They hustled me into the back of a 
car, where I sat alone for a time.  I watched from the distance of the barricades far down the two 
lane, while they called in a hearse to cart the corpse away, after they had finished making their 
strange study of it. 
Eventually, I was disturbed by the latch of the door opposite me.  A big man climbed 
inside to sit next to me.  His was a familiar face. 
“You did it, kid!” he gushed all at once. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
303 
I let a blank stare smooth my face, and blinked at him.  “Did what.” 
“You set it up real nice.  Finished everything all at once.  You done good, don’t you 
think.” 
I stared at him, and said nothing.  He gripped my knee, pinching me there ticklishly, 
chuckling conspiratorially. 
“Hells bells, boy, your secret’s safe with me.  Just like last time.  Remember.”  I nodded. 
I remembered.  “I told you then, and I’ll tell you now, these things can get out of hand in an 
awful hurry.  You believe me now, don’t you.”  He was smiling, but I had long ago learned to 
recognize the grin of a devil that would destroy me with kindness. 
“I don’t know what you mean, sir,” I replied respectfully. 
“Oh, come on, kid,” he enthused, my friend to the end, or so it seemed.  He reached 
beneath his coat, where I saw a badge and a gun, and fetched a wadded roll of chewing tobacco.  
Plucking a huge fistful from this, he continued his false merriment, and tucked the pouch way 
with one hand, wrapping the other about my shoulders to pull me close.  “Don’t play me for an 
idiot, boy.  Give me some credit, huh.  This old farm boy’s seen a thing or two, you know, and 
seen enough to know.” 
“Know what.” 
“That you set it up neat.  Nice.  Pretty.  Prettier than anybody, except me and one other 
maybe, besides you, will ever know.  Now, see there.  I give you credit, don’t I.  Credit where 
credit is due.  You should do the same for me, don’t you think.”  He didn’t offer me time to 
reply, but leaned close, chewing his cheekful of satisfying suicide.  “Ah, hell, what’s it matter, 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
304 
anyway, kid.  Huh.  The truth, I mean.  What is it, but the biggest load of shit ever shoveled by 
man, woman or child.  The truth, kid.  What the fuck do we know about the truth. 
“They say,” he confided, leaning closer still to all but whisper into the shell of my left 
ear, “‘Thou shall not kill’.  Right, boy.  Then, what do they do.  They shove an M-16 into your 
hand and they shout ‘KILLL!’, don’t they.  Leastwise, that’s what they did with me.  And I 
killed.  More than I care to remember.  Now you’ve done it.  So tell me, kid, how does it feel.” 
I glowered.  “In case you didn’t notice, sir, I was nowhere near that shotgun.” 
He smiled a devil’s smile.  “Now, you’re not giving me the credit I deserve, are you.  
You remember me from my old beat, ‘cause that’s why I remember you.  Fifteen years I served 
in a squad, before they handed me this gold shield,” he gushed, lifting the lapel of his coat with 
his left hand to shine it for me.  “And two or three behind IT.  Homicide, that’s what I’m 
working these days, did you know. County homicide.  You know what that means, don’t you, 
John.” 
I nodded.  “Killing of man.”  I translated it from the root and suffix.  “Except I didn’t kill 
anyone.” 
“Didn’t you, though.  Better than I’ve EVER seen, too!”  For a moment, a mad, confused 
moment, I could no longer be certain if he was serious, or if he was, as I had at first thought, 
simply trying to suck me out of my shell and into a quick confession. 
Ultimately, I decided it was his job to convict me, and not his job to be my friend.  So I 
held my tongue.  He seemed to see this decision within me, within my young, naive gaze, 
perhaps, and it soured him. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
305 
Returning to his side of the backseat, he regarded me coolly.  “You know something, 
kid.”  I shook my head.  I knew nothing.  “You scare me,” he returned softly.  “I mean, you 
really scare liquid shit out of me, and that’s saying something, too, ‘cause I’ve seen just about 
every kind of character there is, but you... you, kid...” 
He sighed, and rolled down the window to spit a stream of brown saliva into the bar 
ditch.  “Thing of it is,” he continued, grunting with the manual window lever, “Even if you were 
to spill your guts to me on videotape, I could never convict you of it.  Not in a million years.  
That’s why you scare me, John.  I can’t imagine the depths of your mind, you being thirteen 
years old, and all.  Having set this... mess up like the pieces in a game of Chess.” 
“I didn’t do anything wrong, sir,” I asserted blackly, and I meant it, I believed it.  These 
words were the truth.  As for Chess...  I corrected him.  I said, “If it was a game of Chess, then it 
was, at least, a winning game.  Check and mate.”  I instantly realized my mistake. 
For then, at that moment, he was certain of himself, where before he was only guessing.  
His devil’s smile broadened, “Your aunt, your mother’s sister that is, says you gave him the 
shotgun for his birthday.” 
“That’s right.” 
“With five boxes of shells.”  I nodded.  “Now why that sort of gift, John.  That’s what I 
want to know.  Why then.” 
I shrugged.  “It was what he wanted.” 
“You felt you should give him what he wanted.” 
“Of course.  He was my father.” 

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Stephen Huff 
306 
“He was your step-father, you mean,” he corrected, in turn.  “Funny, last time I remember 
seeing you, there was no love lost on your old man.  Last time I remember seeing you, John, it 
was him with a broken nose, wasn’t it.  This time... his brains, splattered all over the driveway.  
Not much has changed.  Except-” he stated bluntly, pausing for effect, “Except for the fact, John, 
that you’re no longer standing up for your mother like you used to do.  Are you.” 
Again, I shrugged.  “I did the best I could for her.  I’m only a kid, you know.” 
“A kid, and I’m Jesus-Fucking-Christ.  You’re no more a kid than I am.”  He sighed 
again, and switched the wad of tobacco from one cheek to the other with his tongue.  “But I 
guess that much of it, at least, was a fuck up for you, wasn’t it.  Your mom getting it that way, I 
mean.” 
I returned his blank look blankly.  He knew what he knew, and it was irrelevant, I thought 
at the time, to confirm or deny. 
For the first time, I shocked him.  He whistled long and low, releasing a pensive breath.  
“Christ,” he cursed again, “You planned that part, too.  Christ.  Now I’ve seen everything.” 
“No,” I returned dully.  “You haven’t.  Not by a long shot.” 
That made him mad.  “What the fuck do you know about it, kid.  Huh.  What the fuck do 
you know about what I’ve seen and done and heard.” 
My immediate response was, “I know, sir, that you were never fucked up the ass when 
you were ten years old.  I know that much.”  Again, I regretted saying it even before it was 
finished, because I was thinking of one word.  I was thinking of ‘motive’, but there it was, said 
and finished.  Irretrievable. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
307 
Still, I was thirteen years old.  I couldn’t be tried as an adult, even if the worst came.  I 
knew it.  He knew it.  Just as he and I both knew how the bastard had deserved it.  Him, and, yes, 
her, too. 
The detective appraised me with a long, deep, penetrating stare.   I returned it, and felt his 
eyes delving into the depths of my mind through the front doors of my own pupils.  I let him in 
to observe.  I let him take a tour, see what he had come to see. 
He shivered.  “You’re a puzzle, John.  A real puzzle.  Most kids in your situation hit the 
street as runaways and end up strung out somewhere on drugs, hustling their own ass to get 
bumped through the day, but you’re too smart for that, aren’t you.  I checked.  A straight ‘A’ 
average in all your classes, a perfect one hundred percentile in three of them, too.  Three of six, 
and high nineties in the rest.  A valedictorian in the making, and an athlete, too.  You joined the 
junior squad last year, ‘C’ string, now you’re on the starting lineup, and they just can’t wait to 
get their hands on you in high school, I hear.” 
I must have shown surprise.  I had wondered, after all. 
Because he caught it, and added, “Oh, yeah, kid.  I hear.  I hear lots of things.  For every 
pile of shit in this county, there’s a shovel, John, did you know.  I am that shovel.   Sometimes, 
it’s to the can with the crap, and sometimes, John, sometimes, for one reason or another, it’s a 
pile of shit left unmolested.  Because sometimes, John, there’s nothing I can do.  There’s no 
shovel big enough to gather it all.  So it sits and rots, undisturbed, and it stinks up the place for 
the rest of us.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
308 
He turned his gaze out the window, toward the place I had once called both home and 
hell in the same breath, and he shook his head mysteriously.  “This is one of THOSE piles of 
shit, John.  I know what you did.  You know what you did.  God knows what you did.”  He 
returned his cold, understanding gaze upon me.  “But it’s not enough for this world.  Because the 
truth, John, is the ultimate pile of shit.  Most of the time, it means nothing to nobody, and, when 
it does, it’s nothing pleasant or beautiful.  It’s ugly and foul.  It’s rotten through to the core, the 
truth, because the truth is full of itself, John, and therefore contains everything, good or bad.  
Whereas a lie is most often beautiful and pleasing to the eye, simply because a lie leaves out the 
truth.  That’s the entire nature and purpose of a lie, isn’t it.  So few people want to see the truth, 
and most prefer to see the lie. 
“Though there are a few, John, that will see simply because they want to KNOW, even if 
they are incapable of doing anything whatever about it.  That’s my job, to KNOW, even when I 
don’t want to know, and even when, no especially when, there is nothing to be done about it.”  
He slapped my knee, and pinched it playfully again, so I winced.  “For the time being.  Did you 
know, boy, that there is no statute of limitations on a murder charge.” 
I remained undaunted.  This was a day for him and a lifetime for me.  I had come to the 
field well prepared to play, eager for the win.  For him, it was just another job in a long line of 
jobs.  Nothing, absolutely nothing of any value, was at stake in it.  For him. 
“Yes, in fact, I do know that, sir.  I also know that I didn’t murder anyone, and I’m not 
afraid.  I am never afraid.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
309 
He grunted.  “Yeah, I remember you saying that last time.  It certainly seems like 
you’re inculpable here, boy, that’s for damned sure.  So you’re right.  You’ll walk, sure 
as shit, but you’re also wrong, kid.” 
“Wrong how.” 
“Because, like I said, there’s you, then there’s me that knows.  Then there’s God.  
Which do you think matters most.”  Saying this, he popped open the door latch at his 
elbow, spat into the dust, and climbed out onto the two lane.  Leaning back through the 
door, he finished with, “You just think about that now, you hear.  You think about that 
for the rest of your murderous life, boy.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
310 

 

T 

Three 

Three of us, I thought so many years later.  Three of us that know.  Him.  Me.  
And God.  Which mattered most. 
God, I thought, when I was younger.  Not now.  Now I knew better.  God, in this 
life, is irrelevant in such matters of conscience, as is all else, save for that voice.  That 
tiny, snide, whispering voice.  The voice that knew and was never silent.  The voice that 
was accusation and condemnation and loathing consideration from the first crime to the 
last.  The voice that ever echoed within the space of my own skull.  The voice that was 
me. 
God could wait.  The voice would not. 
It was here.  It was now.  It was today, this instant.  Even as it was a long trail of 
words that stretched back to those days.  Even as it ever led me into the future.  It was... 
unavoidable. 
I have never been anything close to a saint.  I cannot say what righteous men may 
hear from that voice.  I cannot say if they may ever have an end of it when they so desire.  
I have never been a righteous man, and my voice is never quiet.  Rather than falling silent 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
311 
when I wish for silence, it rises in pitch and volume until it becomes an undeniable din.  
It must be heard. 
For it is but a small measure of the entire cost of my criminality.  It taxes me for 
the profit of my illicit gains in this life, and forebodes worse things to come with the next. 
When I want to feel clean, it is a fine coat of slime that will not be washed away.  
When I want to feel holy, it is the bully pulpit from which spouts a charge of evil.  When 
I want to be good, it is the constant reminder that I am evil.  It goads me with the stink of 
my own hypocrisy when I would attempt to breathe freely, and when I long for absolute 
freedom, it is there to remind me of my cages.  When I walk among the righteous, it is the 
unclean reek that betrays me.  When I speak to the forthright, it is the glint of 
concealment that shines my lie, and turns them away. 
It is a mad tangle of aberrant growth born of a single seed that has run wild 
through time, as it has been left to neglect by virtue of its own thorniness.  I dare not 
touch it.  I dare not debate it. 
The voice is the only truth I know.  To deny it, even once, would be a surrender of 
my soul to its claims of darkness.  To bear it without protest was, I felt, a kind of payment 
for my many damned purchases in this life.  Above all else, regardless of what I had 
done, was doing, or might do, I wanted to stand on my own two feet and meet everything 
head to head.  Above all else, I wanted to remain undaunted and unafraid.  Above all else, 
I hated a whiner. 
It was my long, hot row to hoe, I knew, and the harvest mine, as well, no matter 
how bitter or poisonous.  For I had sown its seeds. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
312 
I stared out the Datsun’s front windshield at the white line that divided the two lane, and I 
counted the miles.  I thought how much like the words of my own thoughts was that line.  Each 
mile a sentence.  With hundred sentences, make a page, and a thousand make a book.  Endless 
and dreary as the contrasting colors of their condition, black upon white, white upon black, all, 
apparently, the same though dissimilar.  All to be read once and discarded, stored somewhere to 
the back of me, where I could not directly see.  Indecipherable, they were, and at the same time 
very plainly read.  Each character of it a symbol of abstraction, a meaningless utterance, that, 
combined, formed a long-winded and irrelevant diatribe, but busy work to mark time until the 
inevitable end. 
She interrupted after a time.  “Where are we going, Johnny.” 
After a long struggle, I tore my hypnotized gaze away from the rushing blacktop, and 
caught her eyes.  Then I glanced at the thing in the backseat, half expecting to see it sleeping, as 
a little girl should after so long a drive, but finding it, instead, wide awake, eyes bright and 
beaming, eagerly listening for my answer. 
I shrugged.  “Wherever this road takes us.” 
We had been driving for hours, I was certain of it.  I glanced at the fuel gauge.  Half a 
tank left.  I looked again.  Chills crawled my spine.  I repeated, with more certainty, “Wherever 
the road takes us.” 
“I want to go to DALLAS!  I want to go to DALLAS!  I want to go to DALLAS!” 
bounced the little girl thing, setting her pig tails to fly.  “DALLAS, TEXAS!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
313 
“You would,” but I was thinking of the gaunt old man, and of the handgun that remained 
tucked into my belt.  I was remembering that city from my many visits to it.  I was remembering 
its arenas, wherein I had as a gladiator waged my vain, childish contests, and I was longing for 
those days again. 
Presently, we topped a rise, which revealed an opening in the sprawling forest, through 
which opening we could see into the far distance.  A long, silver serpent snaked the horizon, 
bound from north to south.  Tiny silver sparkles moved along its length, betraying the interstate 
highway for what it was.  Then we plunged down the far side of the hill and descended once 
more into the trees. 
Miles later, the two lane delivered us to a dead end intersection.  A sign stood opposite 
us, bearing an arrow pointed to our right beneath large white on blue letters.  ‘I-35', it read. 
Exchanging glances with the dark one to my right, and trying not to notice the little girl at 
my back, I rolled my sweat slicked grip around the Datsun’s steering wheel, and returned my 
vision to the road sign before me.  Right or left.  Forward or fade.  Ever a man’s only choices in 
life. 
I glanced to the left, and thought of the freedoms to be found there.  Then I glanced back 
again to the right, to think of my cages. 
I shifted into first.  I revved the Datsun’s engine and let slip the clutch slowly.  I felt my 
hands rolling the wheel around to the left.  I glanced in that direction to check for oncoming 
traffic. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
314 
The road was empty of traffic, though it was not entirely empty of presence.  For there, 
sitting squarely atop the center line, brooded an incredibly large, black dog, its iron collar 
glinting dully beneath the sun’s light, its eyes burning with fierce warning. 
“Left is not the way,” hissed the little one behind me. 
“Yeah,” I breathed softly.  “I guess not.”  Spinning the wheel hard right, I smoked the 
tires from first through third gears. 
“So,” I encouraged later, as we turned onto the Interstate, bound south, “You never told 
me how you came into... town.”  I glanced at her quickly, to let all know it was to the dark one I 
was speaking, and not the girl child thing. 
She stared out the windshield at the passing scenery.  Early spring painted the land with 
the gaudy texture and the lurid pigments of wild flowers that I counted by the millions.  Blue 
Bonnets clustered along the way in vast patches, so I knew I was home again. 
“So beautiful...” she sighed breathlessly.  “And so temporary.  Next week, they’ll be 
gone.” 
“Next week,” I returned ominously, “I don’t think we’ll care.” 
“How I came into town.” she repeated dreamily.  “It’s been so long, I almost forget.  
Years ago.  Decades, maybe.  I was very young, and I did a very bad thing.  Afterward, I just 
walked away.  I started walking until I was completely lost in the world, and, when I was certain 
I was truly lost, I walked further still, until I was not only lost, I was forgotten.  Until I was 
disappeared completely from the Earth.  Until I was delivered at the end of all roads, where the 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
315 
final barricades wait.”  She turned her large, liquid, brown eyes upon my right cheek, so I could 
feel her gaze burning upon me as I drove.  “You’ve been there, no.” 
I nodded.  “Yeah.  I’ve been there.  It wasn’t... what I expected, though.” 
“Is anything, ever.” 
“What about the very bad thing that you did.” 
I felt her frown, more than I saw it.  It came in her tone when she replied, “Do you really 
want me to talk about it.  After all, if you ask and I answer, then I will ask, and you will answer, 
in turn.” 
Brooding for a time, I ultimately relented.  “Okay, then tell me why you left.” 
“Because,” she answered eventually.  A lengthy pause followed, and I thought she might 
coyly leave it there, but, just as I opened my mouth to prompt, she added, “You asked.” 
“That’s it, huh.  Because I asked, it’s that simple.” 
“Because YOU asked,” she repeated, emphasizing the ‘me’ in it.  “I was... waiting for 
you.  Though I didn’t know it until you arrived.  Does that make sense.” 
I thought of her, and of the other, darker one that might have been her twin, and I made 
no answer.  I no longer cared to make sense of anything.  Understanding had become the 
ultimate exercise in futility, and sense was the white line.  It meant something, I knew, but what.  
It led somewhere, I guessed, but where.  Somewhere it must end with the ultimate answer, but 
why. 
I laughed suddenly.  I knew where we were going. 
“It’s Sunday, isn’t it.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
316 
“I don’t know.”  Her answer was puzzled. 
“Yeah, this is Sunday.  Mid-season.  They’ll be playing today.  I wonder what time.”  On 
impulse, I flipped the radio power switch and tuned to a local station.  She started to speak just as 
a sports break interrupted the music.  I silenced her with a finger and listened intently until I 
heard what I wanted to hear. 
“So,” I sighed, easing back into my seat, “That’s it.” 
“What is.” 
I smiled, and felt a familiar light burning in my leering gaze.  “Honey, have you ever 
been to a professional football game.  No.  How about some box seats.  I think I know just 
where to get the tickets.” 
She was frowning now.  “Whatever you say, Johnny.  I’m going wherever you are.” 
Of course she was.  I shifted my legs and felt the cold, comforting weight of the 
automatic handgun lean against the waistline of my slacks. 
“It’s not going to be easy,” I offered after an eternity of thought.  “But, then, such things 
rarely are.” 
“I know.  I don’t care.”  She swallowed and forced a smile.  “I’m going wherever you 
are.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
317 
I nodded, and tried to return her smile.   It was a forced grin, however, and my 
gaze was distracted.  I was looking at her face, but I was seeing the countenance of 
another.  I was reflected in the liquid surface of her huge, dark eyes, but I was swimming 
in the regard of another.  Here I was seated at her left, but my true companion at that 
moment was far, far away, though looming closer by the minute. 
One last embrace.  Just one.  One was all I needed, was all I wanted.  Just one. 
“Johnny.” she asked after a time, her face pale and her voice pinched.  She had 
shrunk from my gaze, which stretched dangerously long.  “The road, Johnny!” 
Blinking, I snapped awake, and jerked the wheel hard left to avoid the shoulder of 
the highway.  “Sorry,” I breathed, struggling to stifle the blazing inferno shining from 
within my brooding eyes. 
“It’s her, isn’t.  The one I remind you of, I mean.” 
“Yeah.  So what.” 
She sighed, prying her fingernails from the Datsun’s abused armrests.  “So, 
nothing.  I was just asking, that’s all.” 
I knew it wasn’t finished.  Sometime later, she asked again, “Johnny.” 
“What.” 
“Do you think... is it possible, I mean, that somehow... some day...” her voice 
trembled, which vaguely disturbed me.  I had not thought it an aspect of her character, 
timidity.  Yet, here it shone clearly.  “Never mind.” 
“Never mind what.” 
“Nothing.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
318 
I continued breathing, driving, thinking... thinking of her.  I let the matter lie.  
Still, I knew it was not finished. 
Miles further along, she tried again.  “Johnny.” 
“What.” 
“Do you still love her.  Really love her, I mean.” 
It was a tough question.  I had often pondered its answer during the dark ages that 
had passed since our parting.  It knew an inconstant solution; at times positive, and at 
times negative.  I was rarely certain of the truth, and when I felt I was, I also felt a 
sinking dread that told me tomorrow the truth would change.  I loved her.  I loathed her.  
I longed to caress her.  I longed to strangle her. 
“No.  Not really.  I think.” 
“But you’re not sure.” 
“Not right now.  Tomorrow, maybe, but not right now.” 
“Still, you’re not certain that you love her, either.” 
“Maybe.  I know one thing: I hate her.” 
“And love her.” 
“Sometimes.  Less each day, I suppose.  Yet, sometimes.” 
“But you hate her more.” 
I shrugged.  I struggled to stifle the conflagration blazing in my murderous 
thoughts, to manage a furtive glance in her direction, toss her a lopsided grin.  The effort 
failed miserably.  Her frown deepened, and she turned away. 
To the window, she said, “It’s alright, Johnny.  It’s alright with me.  I don’t care.  
Just tell me one thing... tell me that you love and hate me the same way, Johnny, for the 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
319 
same reasons.  Because I’m her in your eyes, sometimes.  Right, Johnny.  Sometimes, 
when you love her, you love me, too.” 
“Yeah, okay,” I offered.  She refused to face me.  It was all so sick, I knew, but it 
was a sickness without a cure.  I was powerless to stifle its symptoms and must allow its 
course to run, to ravage me, to burn me down with its grotesque fevers, to exhaust me 
with its mortal struggles. 
I found myself wondering as I drove.  I wondered how I had come to this.  To 
have fallen from such high promise to such low circumstance, I considered morbidly.  I 
wondered where I had made the first mistake of such a long train of mistakes.  Was it 
with her.  Was it with him.  Or was I a victim of my birth, slaved to an inevitable fate. 
These were tired, ancient questions.  They were a wheel to turn a rat.  Over and 
over and over again in nauseating regularity.  Insanely monotonous, I longed for death 
amidst their plague of me.  I shook my head, yearning to clear it, though it refused to 
clear.  She was so near, coming nearer.  At last!  My heart churned.  My breath choked.  
My mind reeled.  I felt the fingers of my right hand stiffen straight then snap shut on the 
seat near my thigh. 
In that moment, I heard a snide snigger from the backseat.  “Jack and Jill went up 
a hill,” the little girl thing giggled, “To fetch a pail of water.  Jack fell down and broke his 
crown, and Jill lived happily ever after!” 
“Shut up, you!” I snarled, rounding in the seat to savagely strike her across the 
face in a sudden, uncontrolled rage.  It was her tone, I thought, it was her voice, berating 
me with a burning dispassion. 
The dark one screamed, “Johnny!  No!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
320 
My arm was already in motion.  For a mad instance, as I turned in my seat to face 
her, the little girl thing was gone, to be replaced by the black-shelled insect thing.  Then 
she was a child again, dodging from one side of the seat to the other, pigtails and chiffon 
skirts flying.  She hissed and spat.  I missed my mark. 
“Kissy, kissy!” she squealed.  “Smacky, smacky!  Yech!  ‘Johnny’,” she mocked, 
“‘Do you love me.  Do you still love her.  Oh, love me, Johnny, love me!  Fuck me, 
Johnny, fuck me!’” 
“You watch your mouth!” 
“Or what.” 
“Or-” I stopped myself.  Or nothing, of course.  What could I do. 
She was up and down in the seat now, bouncing excitedly.  “I want to see some 
FOOTBAAALL!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
321 

 

U 

Unborn 

Near the end, I found a bill tucked away in the center drawer of her desk.  That 
desk was a private space in our home, never to be invaded, but I was there at her request, 
searching for her lipstick or keys or some nonsensical something.  I think back on it now, 
and I consider how mundane it must seem, how stereotypical.  Wasn’t that always the 
way of it.  A slip of paper left in a coat pocket... A smear of lipstick showing on a collar 
or lapel...  An overheard telephone conversation...  A bill carelessly tossed into a 
drawer... 
Of all the papers and envelopes scattered within the drawer, that bill in particular 
caught my attention because it bore a Nevada address.  She had made a weekend trip 
there some weeks earlier without explanation.  I hadn’t thought much of it at the time.  
We were in a habit of going our own way by then.  The date coincided with her 
mysterious vacation, however, and I was curious.  Naturally curious, you understand, not 
suspiciously curious. 
So I scanned the printout quickly.  She had spent seventeen hundred dollars and 
some change.  The service rendered was described in cold, technical terms.  I deciphered 

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Stephen Huff 
322 
the jargon and derived a simpler understanding of the matter.  Abortion.  They had 
performed a second trimester abortion on her. 
My heart sank then as it is sinking now.  I cannot begin to describe the 
overwhelming sense of loss I felt then, am feeling now.  Of Christmas smiles never to be, 
of junior league footballs and baseballs never to be thrown, of birthday cakes never to be 
eaten, of all these things that are unborn children.  My children.  Unborn. 
I seethed, as I am seething now.  I raged, as I have raged for ages. 
For the first time, I hated her.  I despised her. 
Managing my face carefully, I retrieved the unremembered article I had come to 
find, and I closed the drawer, tucking the bill into my trouser pocket.  I crossed the foyer 
at a steady pace, though my heart raced as madly as if it were a ten yard line and me on a 
sneak around the wide end.  I mounted the stairs with deliberate, rising steps. 
She met me at the top.  Her face remained neutral, a familiar false grin stretched 
across her lips. She held out her hand for the delivery of my errand, and I handed it up to 
her.  Upon seeing my face, her brow clouded.  I could see her considering my demeanor, 
puzzling the obvious change in me. 
After a few moments, it must have crossed her mind.  She perhaps remembered 
the receipt, but she was giving nothing away. 
Turning smartly, she strode across the mezzanine to her room.  I followed, though 
she pushed the door closed in my face, pretending to be unaware of my tag along 
presence.  While she stood before a towering mirror to fix her makeup and straighten her 
hair, I pushed the heavy door wide again and leaned against the frame.  I couldn’t drag 
my eyes away from her. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
323 
She was so beautiful in that moment.  A beautiful, perfect creature.  I realized for the first 
time how it was inevitable that the devil should present himself so before a man, as a beautiful 
woman, I mean.  For, gazing at her enthralling reflection then, I could never dare to guess the 
horrid truth of her nature.  Beauty was innocence.  Beauty was all absence of guile.  Beauty 
implied virtue, belied vice.  Beauty was synonymous with unspoiled purity.  Beauty was 
everything that evil was not supposed to be, and, therefore, beauty was the ultimate disguise for 
evil. 
For she was, indeed, beautiful, and she was, in fact, evil.  Such a gruesome crime had 
scarcely stirred a ripple in her demeanor.  I couldn’t see the seams of it in her face at all.  If not 
for the receipt clutched tightly in my fist, which was thrust into my pocket, I should not have 
known.  I wondered then with the same pang of dread and horror that I am feeling now, how 
many times.  How many times had she done such things. 
After seconds that stretched an eternity, my intent scrutiny unnerved her.  She stopped 
her falsely busy preening, and cocked a hip to demand petulantly, “What.” 
I grinned a sheepish dog’s grin.  I so badly wanted to say so many things, that I could say 
nothing at all.  I simply shook my head, and sucked long, deep, disquiet breaths. 
Finally, I offered, “How was Reno.” 
She immediately rolled her eyes, sighing with exaggerated exasperation, and turned to 
stalk across her bedroom to a deep, broad closet.  Pulling her blouse over her head, she paused 
before its opened door to unhook her bra and drop it to the polished hardwood floor. 
“Hot.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
324 
“Hotter than Texas.” 
“Yeah, I guess.”  Cupping her delicate breasts with her left forearm, she stooped to 
retrieve her garments and toss them onto a hamper standing just inside the closet.  “I spent most 
of my time in the casino.” 
“Did you.” 
“Yes, Johnny, I did.” 
“Did you do anything else.” 
“Like what.” she was cool.  She disappeared into the closet. 
I rolled my own eyes shut, and blew a long, frustrated wind through pursed lips.  I willed 
the strength. 
“Did you see the sights.” 
“What sights, darling.  It was Reno, Nevada.” 
Her words were a sour lemon. I sucked all the juice from them and rendered the 
appropriate mask upon my face. 
“Did you see anyone we know.” 
“Nope, not a soul.” 
“None of your friends went.” 
She appeared at the door again, struggling into another brightly colored top.  “What do 
you mean.” 
“Were you alone.” 
“Quite alone.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
325 
“You just gambled and slept and returned home.  Nothing else.” 
“Right.  What’s this all about, anyway, darling.  If I didn’t know better, I might swear 
you were jealous.” 
“Jealous.  Of what.” 
She shrugged.  “How the hell am I to know.” 
I trembled.  I imagined her face smeared with terror, her on her back, her wild hair 
arrayed about her beautiful face.  I imagined my hands balled into fists.  I imagined those fists 
descending again and again.  I considered the bloodstains and the noise.  I thought how I might 
explain the disturbance and purge the evidence.  I devised methods for disposing of her broken 
body. 
When I shook myself aware again, it was to the strong scent of her burning perfume.  She 
was standing directly before me, her eyes on a level with my chin. 
“Well.” she demanded sharply. 
“Well, what.” 
“Are you going to let me pass, or aren’t you.” 
I lingered in her way.   My broad body filled the door frame. 
Slowly, I stretched out my thick arms and placed my heavy hands on her shoulders.  My 
fingers inched nearer to her long, tender neck.  My thumbs hooked beneath her chin.  Yet I held 
my throttle, and simply turned her chin to present her face. 
“Tell me one thing, first,” I declared softly.  “Tell me, if you can, why.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
326 
She remained motionless in my grip.  She blinked her big, beautiful eyes and kept her 
face still and calm as the surface of a high mountain lake.  Scarcely a ripple stirred her 
expression. 
“Why what.” 
“Why...” I whispered, “Why me.” 
Jerking her head free, she stepped backward and crossed her arms defiantly.  Now her 
mask of ambivalence was replaced with one of abject disgust. 
“Oh, Christ, Johnny, not that again!” 
I felt my jaw clamp shut savagely to hear her tone.  I felt my fingers stiffen straight and 
rigid, and I thought of my mother. 
“No,” I returned, surprised at my own apparently relaxed tone.  “Not that again.  Rather, 
this!” and I thrust the incriminating receipt into her face, fluttering it there beneath her perfectly 
powdered nose. 
She snatched it from my grip, scanned it, and discarded it with a casual wad and toss.  
“You shouldn’t go sneaking through private matters!” 
“Private matters aren’t left in the open for any casual reader.  You placed it there on 
purpose.  You wanted me to know!  You wanted me to see!” 
“You’re right, of course, Johnny.  You know everything!” 
“Tell me about it.” 
“You already have the whole story.  You read the receipt, the end.” 
“It’s not enough.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
327 
“It’s not your business!” 
“Like hell it isn’t!” 
She paused to seethe.  I summoned up the courage to see through her wicked beauty, and 
I detested her.  With that, my composure snapped. 
“You little WHORE!” 
With the surprising speed of a top-dollar tight-end, she surged forward to slap my face 
savagely.  Though she was slight, the force of it rattled my teeth.  Then she was around me in a 
dodge. 
I reached for her, but she was gone.  Her heels virtually struck sparks from the polished 
floor of the mezzanine, as she hurried to the stairs. 
There she paused to face me with a brutally cruel smile, “How dare you.  You being no 
better than a cheap whore, yourself, Johnny!” 
“Fuck you!”  She started down the stairs with a sharp, rapid pace.  I went after her.  From 
the top riser, I demanded, “It was my child, too!  Why didn’t you ask me.!  Why did you do it 
that way.!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
328
On the landing, she stopped to face me.  “You fool.  I didn’t ask you because it 
WASN’T your child, Johnny.”  Laughing sinfully, she dashed across the foyer to the 
front door, where she stopped again to thrust the final vicious blow home.  “None of them 
were!” 
I heard the doors open and close, but I didn’t see her leave.  Leaning heavily 
against the banister, I collapsed to the floor, and I wept. 
Not because I thought it was wrong.  Not for the great loss that it was.  Not for the 
bestial criminality of it.  I wept because I felt it was probably all for the best, and best for 
all. 

 

 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
329

 

V 

Voices 

As we are born, it is born within us.  As children, we know nothing of its cage, 
and all of its wild freedoms.  As adults, we are tasked with its mastery.  We are charged 
with its shackle.  Inevitably, as a rite of passage no less critical or demanding than any 
midnight aboriginal practice, we must prove our sheer management of it to our peers or 
face the ultimate sanction.  We must present ourselves before authority and display our 
control of the animal.  We must demonstrate our supreme understanding of the human 
condition.  We must individually cage our own inner savages.  Or we, ourselves, must be 
caged instead.  No third option exists. 
We must be law opposed to lawlessness, or we are outlaw.  We must be order 
juxtaposed to the chaos of nature, or we are uncivilized.  We must seem abstinently right 
where longing is wrong, or we are wanton.  These ideals of Puritanism are not loved by 
the animal, therefore these ideals are useful in demonstrating control of our beasts. 
For it is a simple matter to say to a man (or a woman) ‘Thou shall not kill’, and 
then sit back to see what happens.  In the end, a man (or a woman) will or will not kill.  

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
330
Therefore, a division evolves:  this side and that side.  Killers and those that have not 
killed.  Thieves and those that will not steal.  Liars and lovers of the truth.  Simple. 
Yet the beast inside us covets thoughts of murder.  The animal inside us secretly 
prefers theft to labor.  The monsters of our id are nothing if not bound to the rigors of 
camouflage and deceit. 
So, even for the best of us, it is a steep slope to climb. It is a long, arduous walk, 
the walk of righteousness.  Few of us successfully manage it.  Of those few that manage 
it, I imagine fewer still are genuinely happy to do so 
For most of us, it is not so much a matter of God or of the law; rather it is more a 
matter of multiple, opposing fears.  I fear loss, so I refuse to steal.  I fear death, so I 
abstain from murder. 
Though I long to commit these acts at times.  When a beautiful woman passes 
near me in the dark and we are alone, I think of rape.  When it is unlocked and no one 
seems to be watching, I ponder its illicit ownership.  When I am enraged, and all the 
proper implements are at hand, I plan murders. 
Even at the brink of such vivid schemes, however, it must generally seem an 
unmanageable distance between thought and action.  Unfortunately and as often, 
however, the distance is slight, briefly crossed.  At times, we arrive there without 
thinking, without notice.  At times, the decision is come and gone again before we’ve 
made it.  Sometimes the decision is locked in the circumstance, and there is no choice.  
Sometimes, we meet the choice, and we choose the wrong way over the right. 
Our inner animals, like all wild things, have a way of slipping their shackles from 
time to time, of eluding their cages.  Freedom requires but a moment of inaction, an 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
331
instance of apathy, a second of neglect.  Turn your back.  Refuse to see.  Refuse to listen.  
Refuse to think.  Then it grips you by the shoulders as an old familiar friend, that 
monster, and it whispers delicious depravity into your ear.  Take it.  Do it.  Kill it.  
Offering all, punishing nothing. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
332
Maybe you listen.  Maybe you don’t.  Still, it is there, whispering.  As it must 
always be there, whispering. 
As I said, it is born into us all, even as we are all, in turn, born into this world.  It 
is our nether twin of opposite mind.  Regardless of station or rank, wealth or stature, in 
this manner are we all kept company so we are never alone.  Whether in the dark of night 
or the bright shine of the sun, we are of two minds, thus of two voices, and the two voices 
make eternal war between our ears for our attention. 
The frustration of it all is kept in the simple fact that it is never too late to cross 
the line.  We must manage our beasts from the first moment to the last.  No slightest gap 
of vigilance can stand, or else all is lost.  Live a hundred years to cut a throat, and die a 
damned killer as any twenty year old must.  Steal a dime or a dollar, and be marked for 
the same sort of thief. 
Therefore, it is a forever war, an endless struggle, this mastery of our beasts.  
Where we sleep, it wakes.  Where we are glances away, it is hands upon the bars of its 
cages and eyes upon its crimes.  Where we wallow in vice, it is there to wash our brows 
and lift us from the floor, if only to push us on to further self abuse. 
Since it is our life-mate, it is ever at our sides, but a short turn distant.  Surrender 
to its wiles lies less than a second away at any given moment in time.  Turn your head 
just so and catch it there in the darkened corners of your thoughts even now.  Secretly 
seething.  Silently brooding.  Whispering.  Incessantly whispering. 
Listen a moment, I dare you.  Listen a moment, but beware... the beast is the 
source of us.  Our monsters were here first.  In many ways, our monsters are stronger.  
Bend us ever so slightly, and our cages burst open, our demons escape to potentially lay 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
333
waste the world.  Wound us, and we are instantly revenge that would strike back.  Steal 
from us, and we are retribution that would immediately demand its tolls.  Kill us, and be 
instantly subject to a death sentence. 
The dark one at my right elbow, the antithesis of my cage, the mirror image of my 
monster, seemed to follow my thoughts.  She touched my elbow and leaned close to say, 
“We don’t have to go back, Johnny.  We could go... anywhere.” 
I was startled by her touch.  I jumped.  “Go.  Where could we go.” 
“Anywhere, Johnny.  They’re your hands upon the wheel.  Turn around.  Go the 
other way.” 
I considered her words a moment, as I might have considered a dimly 
remembered dream.  I remembered all the times urgent voices had pressed these same 
words into my ears....  Don’t go that way, Johnny.  Nobody ever goes that way...  Don’t 
do that, Johnny, it wouldn’t be smart... Stop a minute, Johnny, listen...  Listen... Listen... 
Well, damn them.  Damn her, too. 
“I can’t stop now.  Now, it’s too late.”  I wanted to add, ‘Where were you ten 
years ago.’ though I already knew the answer to that question. 
“It’s never too late.” 
Had she been surreptitiously recording my inner debate.  “Sometimes.  
Sometimes it’s too late.” 
“Not this time, Johnny.  Just stop the car.  Turn it around.  If you can’t turn it 
around, get out and start walking.” 
“Walking to where.  There’s nowhere for us to go.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
334
“Yes, there is.  We can go anywhere but where you’re going now.  Anywhere else 
will do.” 
I thought about it over the course of many miles.  Ultimately, I decided she was 
right, of course.  It was the only other solution to our problems, the obvious alternative, 
and so it was clearly evident, even to me.  Ever the two ways before a man, forward or 
fade, it seemed impossible to me that so simple a choice should be so damned hard to 
make. 
As if to test her, I flipped the turn indicator, and exited the highway.  The little 
girl thing at my back hissed and was instantly alert. 
The Datsun coasted to a stop.  Straight ahead bore the entrance ramp that would 
return us to the interstate.  While the left presented a u-turn that would deliver us safe 
beneath the overpass and turn us onto the opposite way.  I could see it in my rearview 
mirror, that way.  It was all blue skies and fluffy white clouds and yellow sunshine.  It 
was freedom, there.  While ahead loomed a brooding darkness of storm, the inevitable 
maelstrom that awaited us all three. 
I dropped the turn signal to mark a left turn.  I pursued her way without a word. 
Accelerating, we passed along the frontage road to the opposite-bound entrance 
ramp.  We chose a lane on the highway, and settled into our seats once more.  Minutes 
later, we passed a road sign.  I read it twice before I believed my eyes.  It told us Dallas 
was only sixty six miles further along, while Denton lay just down the road. 
Cursing, I flipped the signal again, ignoring the snide snigger from the backseat, 
and we went round again.  Again, we passed the same way marker.  “Dallas    66". 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
335
“So much for second chances,” I offered bitterly.  Not that I didn’t prefer things 
this way.  It was all for the best, and best for all.  I felt it was meant to be.   It was a steep 
funnel, and I was a liquid in its final, irretrievable moments of decline.  Round and round 
went the downward spiral, faster and faster with each passing moment.  Soon, I would be 
all gone and disappeared.  Only memories of me, of us, should remain. 
It was a comfort now, and not a fear.  The ideal of it was something to long for 
these days, rather than something to avoid.  I prayed to dark gods that would, haughty, 
listen, while I rattled the monster’s corroded cages, and while the monster, enraged, spat 
epithets and curses at the oblivious world.  Together with the endless white line of the 
highway, we hammered it out and nailed it all together, so it seemed to mean something 
important by the time we passed into the outskirts of Dallas, Texas. 

 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
336

 

W 

Writhing Amid a Waste 

We exited the highway to find a bathroom and some gas.  Between the two of us 
and the change we found in the seat cushions, we just managed to fill the tank.  I stood 
pumping the fuel, while she stood near the exterior bathroom door, waiting on the little 
girl thing. 
I watched her carefully through half-slitted eyes and from behind a dark veil of 
terrible thoughts.  I watched how her hips jutted seductively from her body when she 
changed feet, and I noted the dark furrow of her brow when she grew impatient with the 
delay.  I imaged her lips and fit them perfectly to a well known template.  They were 
painted fiercely red and thin.  Being thin, they articulated her every oral movement with a 
delicious contrast.  For her face was pale and her eyes dark, so those lips were a brilliant, 
living thing writhing amid a waste.  From the tight jerk of her dark hair streaming away 
from her face, to the point of her toes and the lines of her ankles, she was her.  Her in 
every relevant way. 
Thoughts of them both sickened and thrilled me.  Without consideration, I turned 
my head to get a good look over both shoulders.  Somebody, somewhere was watching.  I 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
337
was certain of it.  I could feel the burn of it upon my shoulders.  I could sense the 
presence of it from my shadow.  I realized it fully in her.  For here she was.  With me.   
The devil’s own black twin. 
I loved her and I loathed her, because I both loved her and loathed her.  Make a 
double fist of your hands.  Lock fingers against fingers then pull, so it went with us.  Fit 
perfectly together, but of opposite design, of opposing direction. 
We could never truly part.  Yet we could never truly exist in the same space, 
either. 
It was a convenient method of mocking me, I decided, to set her here before me.  
To send her against me.  To remind me so readily of my own wicked, disastrous lusts that 
I could never choke my needs still again, but must suffer them endlessly unto madness. 
Shaking my head, I struggled to clear it.  God damn her, I thought.  God damn 
HIM.  God damn them both and together. 
My fingers worked unbidden now, snapping open to rigid stiffness then shut again 
to hard balls.  Though I naturally could not see it, I felt a blaze of horrible rage in my 
gaze.  Burning...  Crazed burning...  Unreasonable, uncontrolled conflagration.. . A 
bonfire’s violent consumption, my thoughts billowed and gusted and sucked and roared 
unsteadily, then burst alive with a will in an instant.  Maniacal hatred like the burst of a 
hydrogen bomb filled my head. 
The little girl thing pushed the bathroom door open in the same moment, and the 
dark one was gone again.  My mental firestorm rushed out into an inky black, vacuous 
space and was impotently gone. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
338
Pigtails skipped across the concrete apron to dance about my car.  Brightly, she 
sang, “Lit-tle John-ny, Lit-tle John-ny, do you sleep.  Do you sleep...”  Over and over 
again it went for what seemed ages, while the dial of the gas pump ticked its numbers 
with unbearable crawl of a slowly unwinding heartbeat. 
“Will you just shut up, already!” I shouted at last.  That turned a few heads. 
Pigtails stopped dancing, and let her chin fall, destroyed with exaggeration.  Dragging her 
toes, she unhappily stalked to the car and threw herself into the backseat, where she sat pouting, 
her arms crossed obstinately atop her breast. 
A middle aged woman wrinkled her disapproving brow and hurried her own children 
along to their car.  A pair of men fueling a large truck and dressed for fishing leaned over the 
concrete island to get a good look. 
Remembering who and where I was, I turned my attention to my own pump display and 
tried to seem small.  From the corner of my eye, I watched.  These last two put their heads 
together to whisper.  I wondered what they were discussing.  Me, undoubtedly, but which me.  
The unknown me that seemed to simply be an unworthy father.  Or the infamous me that was the 
law enforcement lottery of the week. 
Finally, one appeared to muster sufficient courage.  He stepped over the concrete island 
to stand solidly in my view.  I refused to turn my head. 
He said, “Hey, ain’t you Johnny Bullet.” 
I ignored him, willing the gas tank full.  I didn’t want to seem panicked by his revelation.  
I wanted to appear oblivious. 
Then he came a step closer.  “Say, mister.  You with the little girl, there.  Ain’t you 
Johnny Bullet.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
339
I considered the handgun bulging my waistband.  I considered running.  I considered that 
I didn’t really know what to do.  I couldn’t be caught now.  Not now.  Not when she was so 
close.  I couldn’t allow it all to end so badly, when a proper ending was so near to hand. 
Shuffling my feet nervously, my right hand inched toward rescue.  He took another step.  
I felt the cold metal and aged wood of the pistol’s haft.  I reached for it, imagining how I would 
pull it loose, get its grip, thumb its safety, point it, and squeeze the trigger.  Scenes of blood and 
brains and bits of bone washed across the backs of my eyes. 
Then the dark one slammed the bathroom door open angrily.  “Son of a bitch!” she 
cursed, kicking a trailer of toilet paper from her right heel, “Couldn’t you flush the toilet.”  Her 
faced wrinkled comically, she thumped across the drive and climbed into the car, shouting, 
“Come on, William, we’re late!” 
Still pretending not to have seen or heard him, I put the nozzle away and spun the lid 
down tight.  Rounding the car opposite him, my head down, I opened the driver’s side door and 
started the Datsun. 
As we returned to the frontage road that would lead us once more to the highway, I 
watched from my rearview mirror as he shook his head, and returned to whisper with his friend.  
What would they do.  Anything.  I decided it wouldn’t matter.  They hadn’t forced a 
confrontation, and my salvation lay only minutes away, now. 
“Thanks,” I offered eventually. 
She nodded soberly.  “Think nothing of it.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
340
I didn’t.  In fact, I tried not to look at her, because it was a glimpse of her darker Gemini.  
Instead, I wrestled with my thoughts and struggled to remember the truth. 
For the truth is always a struggle.  Lies come easy.  Easiest of all, the lies we tell 
ourselves.  If you are lucky, then your memory is your friend.  It would lie to you where you will 
it.  Much as a trowel in the hands of a skilled mason, these lies we insidiously tell ourselves 
smooth away the blemishes and stains of our own self-image, make us over into something on 
the outside that we are not on the inside. 
Today, however, I didn’t want to remember a lie.  I wanted to recall it all exactly the way 
it happened.  I didn’t want to overlook the pain of it, I wanted to feel it.  I didn’t want to ignore 
the shame of it, I wanted it to burn my cheeks in a wanton blush.  I didn’t want to be spared the 
indignity of it, I wanted to wallow in it as a swine in a sty.  I didn’t want to misguide myself 
regarding my role in it, either; rather, I wanted to wear it as a noose beneath a gallows.  I wanted 
to swing a condemned man for the facts of it.  I wanted to be damned for the truth, the absolute 
truth of it. 
Steeled against the agony of this truth, much as a man might steel himself against the 
purge of a hot iron or the pull of a rotten tooth, I considered the genuine way of it, I regarded the 
forthright methodology of it, I examined minutely the vile motivations of it, and I remembered... 
...a bright September morning not long past, and her standing amid the brilliant, sunlit 
wash of its sunrise. Come to me again, the smells, the tastes, the touches of it.  I see her now in 
the first person, and I am standing on the tarmac of the private airport where we rent a space for 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
341
our airplane.  She is mounting the little craft’s stair with a final backward glance.  I fill it, I 
know, but I don’t enjoy it. 
She says good-bye with a tight, thin smile.  She waves softly.  He’s sitting at the stick, 
right up front, beaming smugly.  I didn’t know he could fly.  I certainly had no idea he could fly 
MY plane.  Still, he sits there as if he’s done it a hundred times, and I wonder if he has. 
She climbs inside to sit beside him.  I can see luggage piled behind them, an incredible 
mound of it.  They must have been preparing for weeks, months perhaps.  All the while, I lived 
beside them, refusing to see, refusing to hear, refusing to believe.  Now sight and hearing and 
belief all manifest undeniably before me.  Evidence of evidence, it all seemed now.  In the light 
of hindsight, I can clearly decipher every lie, effortlessly betray every deception.  Yet this 
capacity has come too late to save me.  To save her.  To save him. 
Without returning her wave, without returning her smile, without returning his look of 
smug satisfaction, I watch the twin propellers of our little turbo prop fan to life until they are an 
invisible blur.  The aircraft spins smartly about, and rolls to the taxiway.  I follow it with slow, 
trepid steps, my hands tucked into the pockets of my jacket.  Faster and faster it rolls to the end 
of its taxi, before it spins about once more, facing down a runway. 
It accelerates to take off speed.  I watch its nose rise, its flaps retract.  Its wheels rise.  
The end, I realize with a morbid pang of curious dread, is but seconds near.  Strange, I think, I so 
longed for this very moment, but now... now, I wish I hadn’t done it.  Things have gone too far, I 
know, and nothing can stop it.  Still, I wish I hadn’t done it. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
342
I watch.  I watch the little airplane’s wheels come up, and I know what has happened.  I 
can all but see the hydraulic lines cut by a minor alteration I made to the gear.  Fluid must be 
pouring from the wheel wells by now.  Seconds later, just as the hydraulic controls fail, I hear 
both engines cough and stutter then fall silent. 
I watch them plunge from the sky, sloshing tanks full of fuel.  The fireball is bright and 
rises to incredible heights.  A soft concussion strikes me full in the face, even from so great a 
distance.  The sirens come immediately and fill their air with a forlorn wail. 
Something burns in the distance for a long, long time.  I stand and I watch and I wait. 
I wait for the news to come... 
...and I say now, how was I to know.  How was I to guess.  I say now, it seems an 
unfortunate site for a school, but a mile downfield from a runway.  How was I to know.  I 
couldn’t have imagined it.  I certainly didn’t plan for it.  Regardless, it burned... it burned a very 
long time.  Sirens wailed all across the city.  For hours, I listened to them come and go, back and 
forth, back and forth.  I imagined the toll I must have harvested there, but how was I to guess.  
How was I to know. 
To be sure, I am guilty of the lesser crime, though I refuse to accept blame for the larger 
crime.  I refuse to allow my culpability in the deaths of those children.  Theirs were not 
intentional murders.  Theirs were not plotted deaths.  Their fates had been... side effects.  Simply 
put, they had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
343 
I mourn them, I assure you.  As I say, having done it, I immediately wished it 
undone.  Not because I could even begin to imagine the horrors and havoc it must 
prosper, but simply for the basic foolishness of it.  Having done it and my initial hatred 
spent, for the first time I realized how I must be caught and punished.  I realized I had 
finished her.  In the same instant, I realized I had finished me.  I never dreamed of others, 
but I suppose I had finished them, as well.  I realized that terrible truth, too. 
So many, yes.  Wasted so badly, without question, and me, centrally, to blame. 
Therefore, damn me for the truth of it.  Condemn me for the facts of it.   Point me 
out for the shame of it.  Yet, never fail to allow me some measure of justification in it. 
I hated her, and my hatred of her was all I could sense, was all I could think, was 
all I could be. My hatred of her, as surely as any cancer, was a black disease to devour me 
inside to out, and no one to save me.  No one to treat me.  No one to act my physician and 
prescribe a cure.  I was ravaged by it, spent in it, consumed for it, undone with it, 
smashed to insensible pieces against it. 
Mad with it, I wrought vile blasphemy, while fate, destiny, and the lunatic hand of 
fate, reached out to amplify it, much as that same hand had reached out to me throughout 
my life to promote my every action.  Having raised me up so fondly, how appropriate that 
it should let me down again so brutally.  Having aided in my every endeavor, I was not 
surprised when the whims of chance now demanded a form of payment. 
Do it, Johnny Bullet, do it well.  Do it better.  Do it faster.  Do it more. 
On the field or off, it was Johnny Bullet, right through the middle, straight down 
the line.  Touch down. 
God damn it.  God damn her.  God damn me. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
344 
Later the same day, of course and as you know, I received the most terrible news.  
Terrible in its stunning, heart stopping revelation, I say.  I flinched to hear it and was 
instantly sick.  Oh, not that he had died so bloodily, not that so many children had been 
roasted alive in hot jet fuel, not that an entire city block had burned...  No, the damage of 
it was done me when I learned... when I learned she, alone, had survived... 
You can’t see it now, but I’m laughing.  Laughing, laughing, laughing.  I worry 
for my sanity.  I really do. 
I can hear him now, the short, fat official that came to ‘fill me in’.  “It was a 
genuine tragedy,” he said, “But at least there’s a bright side to it all.  At least you still 
have your wife, sir, and her nearly without a scratch.  It’s a miracle, a sure-fired miracle!” 
Ha ha ha.  It was a joke, that’s what it was.  A flaming, fan-fucking-tastic joke! 

 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
345 

 

X 

Xanthippe 

We were early.  Traffic was light.  I pulled over to the side of the interstate, after 
we made our way through, and shifted into neutral.  Setting the parking brake, I cast a 
cold, hard glance at the dark one.  I steeled myself to see her true face, rather than the 
face of that other. 
“This is where we split.”  I popped the hatch, and watched through the rearview 
for oncoming traffic.  “I’m going to get something out of the back, then walk through the 
underpass onto the lot.  From there, I’ll make my way inside.” 
“What about us.” 
Now my glance turned to the little girl thing.  “What about us.” 
“Where should we go.  What should we do.” 
I stared at them from far away for a moment.  “Sister, your guess is as good as 
mine.  I only know where I’m going.”  To myself, silently, I added, and what I’m going 
to do.  As an afterthought, I produced the gaunt old man’s crumpled envelope, and 
dropped it onto the seat. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
346 
Outside, the slipstream of passing cars whipped my shirttail and sleeves and rifled 
my hair with a deadly toss.  Carefully, sidling sideways as a crab, I made my way to the 
rear of the Datsun and lifted the hatch.  I gathered Bonnie’s sinister cargo.  Lifting these 
two sacks to my shoulder, I was surprised by their weight. 
She was outside the car now, standing between her door and the guard rail.  The 
wind drove her slight form backward.  A heavy truck rolled by and all but sucked her out 
of her shoes.  I wondered what she thought she could do here. 
“Johnny!  Wait!” 
I grimaced and slammed the hatch.  One foot over the rail, I paused to ask, 
“What.” 
“Johnny, don’t.  Don’t go.” 
“Why not.” 
“Stay here, with me.  You have so much... so much to live for.”  Her eyes were 
fierce with the sun’s reflection.  Squinting, she brushed stray hair from her gaze.  She 
pressed close.  “Forget her.  Think about me.” 
“I can’t.”  I started over the rail. 
She was there once more to stop me.  “Johnny!” she cried, her grip on my arm 
fierce, her nails biting.  “I am your redemption, Johnny!  I am delivered to save you!  To 
save them.” 
That caught me up short.  I climbed back to her side of the rail.  “You’re nuts.” 
“No, it’s the truth, Johnny, believe it.  I was waiting for you.  I have always been 
waiting for you.”  Her eyes burned into mine.  Her face was pure. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
347 
I saw it for the first time, void of her black shadow.  It was a good face.  A sweet 
face.  An innocent face.  It was the face of a loving, laughing, happy girl child.  I realized 
I had mistaken brooding for concern.  I had wrongly interpreted indifference in shyness.  
I had assumed malignancy in the face of vitality.  Too late.  Too late, I thought, I could 
see. 
My leg jerked to return to the rail, my eyes returned to the dirt.  “Johnny!” she 
gasped once more, reaching for me a second time, stopping me halfway.  “Johnny, listen, 
please.  Just a moment.  A few words, Johnny.  Please.” 
“Why now, of all times.” 
“Because now, of all times, Johnny, is the right time.  The only time.  Now is my only 
chance.  You are one foot on the edge, Johnny, and the other dangling over the drop.  Now, 
Johnny, NOW you can see what’s waiting for you down below.  Now you can see!  Seeing, you 
can believe.  Believe me, Johnny!  Believe me.” 
“I can’t,” I repeated, but I didn’t return to the rail.  “I wish I could, but I can’t.” 
“Try.  You are free today.  You are free tomorrow, if you just walk away.  Just walk 
away.  Put it down, set it aside, forget it.  Forget it.” 
A stir in the rear window caught my attention.  The black, scuttling insect thing lurked in 
the shadows of the Datsun’s interior.  It listened.  It watched.  It waited. 
For the third time, I said, “I can’t,” and reached for the rail. 
For the third time, she was there to stop me with an anxious grasp, “Wait! Let me tell 
you, Johnny!  Let me tell you that I know.  I know what you have done.  I am versed in your 
crimes. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
348 
“Still, I am your forgiveness.  I am your redemption.  As you are mine.  Together, 
Johnny, we can make it all right again.  Together, we are the right hand that would hold the left.”  
She removed her grasp upon my arm to further reach for me, wrap me in a loving embrace.  
Rigid, I returned it callously. 
“You are my key and I am your lock.  You and I together crossed the bridge, Johnny.  
Everything else,” and she shuddered, casting a furtive glance at the ingénue that eagerly 
pondered.  “Everything else is baggage.  Let’s cast it off and leave it here.  Let’s just start 
walking, Johnny, walking away.  We’re free of our benign prisons for the moment, both of us.  
We could be free forever!”  Burying her head in the hollow of my shoulder upon seeing my face, 
she moaned softly, “Oh, why.  Why can’t it sometimes be the other way, Johnny.  Why does 
everything have to be so messy.” 
I soothed her stiffly.  I sighed.  The roar of passing traffic drowned us in tumultuous 
winds.  “It’s all a game, darling.  An endless game.  Somebody pops a cork to start it, and 
somebody pops a cork when it’s finished.  In between... it’s us and the field.  We have to run the 
play we’re handed.” 
Suddenly angry, she stepped back, wiping a disturbed tear from the shade of her 
blackened brow.  She was returned to that face again, and my leg was returned to the rail. 
“Okay,” she breathed, “Okay, Johnny, but will you think of me sometimes, Johnny.  
When it’s all finally finished.  Will you.” 
“Sure,” I returned softly, tossing myself over to the shoulder’s grade.  “I’ll think of you 
often.” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
349 
I thought I heard her add, “I’ll be waiting,” though I can’t be certain.  When I arrived at 
the bottom of the slope that descended to the intersecting underpass, she was gone with the 
Datsun and that black, slippery thing in the backseat.  Really gone, I thought. 
How can a man get back what was.  He can’t.  Nothing remains the same.  Everything 
changes.  Everything fades.  Flippant, I remarked on the beginning and the end.  Flippant, like 
this was not the topic that kept me awake at night.  To be the books between the bookends, I 
considered, walking to the shadowed passage beneath the interstate.  To be other than the 
terminus, I longed.  To be somewhere in the middle of it all, where life was good again, I 
yearned. 
I tried to remember that place, as I stalked along.  I tried to summon those visions, but 
they were not found.  Perhaps, and most likely, I considered, they had never been.  Not really. 
Here at the very far away ends of it all, I suddenly realized, was the place to be.  These 
were my last fading footsteps, my final wheezing breaths, my terminal loping heartbeats.  As a 
man before an ultimate door, I considered what the dark one had said, and I stopped walking. 
A crowd was gathering at the corners with the light, bound to the game.  They carried all 
sorts of goods, most of which were brightly colored, and their faces were made of warm smiles.  
Who were these people, I wondered.  Where did they live.  Could I ever live there, too. 
I turned a quick glance on the interstate, and was shocked to see her there, waiting at the 
rail.  She was not gone after all, I had been fooled by the perspective. 
I thought of her standing at the rail, watching my unconcerned back, as I walked away 
forever, torn perhaps by my lack of attention.  I tried to see myself from her eyes, standing as I 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
350 
was at the corner, ramped up to the fiery gates of hell.  She reached for me with desperate, 
outstretched fingers.  Her eyes were wet, her face anguished. 
Indeed, she would save me.  She would journey to the last inch to cast a lifeline.  For a 
moment, a heartbeat instant, I reached for it.  All I had to do was forget.  All I had to do was turn 
around and walk back the way I had come. 
I was halfway there, it seemed.  My feet were light and happy.  I was on my way to 
salvation. 
Then shadows devoured me, and I understood I had passed with the crowd beneath the 
underpass, instead.  As flotsam borne on a fickle tide, I was swept along. 
She was not apparent from the far side, though I suspected she remained for an agonizing 
time, waiting vainly for a return that must never come.  I, too, sought her out with my eyes, 
wondering... wondering how it might have been. 
One step made the difference, however, and it was the one step that really mattered.  For 
it pointed me along the final path, where my destiny waited.  Like a bright, shining thing that 
only I could see, it loomed before me, filling the noon shadows with a strange, flickering, fatal 
light.  It was a familiar light, that, one I had known intimately many, many times before, for it 
was the awesome shine of a vast conflagration.  It was a bonfire of rage that warmed my bones 
and urged my pace. 
Soon, I gathered with the crowd at the gates of the arena.  When I was standing before the 
ticket turnstile, a familiar face appeared in the crowd. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
351 
I recognized the smile first, for almost everything else about him, including the stink, had 
changed.  On this side of the bridge, the old crow was an altogether different man.  His hair 
brushed neatly into place, his clothing clean and tasteful, though ordinary, he approached, 
extending his hand. 
Which touched my elbow lightly, guiding me to one side.  “What the hell do you think 
you’re doing, Johnny.” he demanded immediately.  “Jesus Christ, son, you can’t just walk 
through the front gates like you’re the same old Johnny Bullet you used to be!”  He cackled 
madly to say it.  Heads turned, but dismissed him.  Wildness would be the rule of the day today, 
rather than the exception, after all.  “Hey, what’s wrong with you, Johnny.  You don’t look so 
focused today.” 
“Focused.” I returned, delicately sniffing the wind.  “You smell better than I ever thought 
you could, old man.” 
His smile was quick and broad.  “Hey, I do the best I can with what I have.  You’re 
another story, though, Johnny.  Don’t you see all those pretty blue uniforms.  A man might think 
you’re simple, walking up to the gate that way.  A man might think you WANT to get caught.  
Tell me it ain’t so, Johnny!  It wouldn’t be good news, ha ha, let me tell you!”  We leaned 
against the shadow side of an immense concrete buttress, and he poked me playfully in the chest 
with his last few words.  “A lot is riding on this play today, Johnny, and you said it yourself!” 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
352 
“What.  What did I say.” my eyes strayed to the crowd, which was slowly 
passing through the gates.  Through the gates, I thought, licking my lips, and closer... 
closer... closer to her.  Why them.  Why not me.  I started forward again, but he was 
there to stop me. 
“Johnny, let’s not get sideways here.  Hey, what’s the matter.  You okay.” 
“Yeah, coach, I got the ball.” 
“Coach.”  His face wrinkled with confusion and hilarity in the same instance.  
“Hot damn, John, I think you’ve lost your ever lovin’ mind!  Boy, get some panties on!  
Ha, ha, ain’t that the shit!”  He sucked a deep breath, and pulled me back into the 
shadows, out of the visibility of an armed guard standing near the ticket counter.  “You 
said we all got to run the play we’re handed, right.” 
“I think I said it better than that, but okay.  Sure.  So what.” 
“So, run the damned play, that’s all.  Don’t screw it up.” 
“What do you expect me to do.  I don’t have tickets.  They all know me.  I 
figured I would get most of the way there, then execute a draw off center, straight down 
the middle.”  I cast a summary glance over my shoulder, returning my attention to his all 
too near face.  “I don’t see anybody up there that could take me.” 
“Johnny,” hedged the old crow, shaking his head dourly, “This ain’t the Super 
Bowl, you know.  Them cops carry big, scary guns, man, they won’t even try to tackle 
you.  They’ll just pop you in the spine, three-fifty-seven style!  Man, you know THAT’s 
gotta hurt!” 
I licked my lips.  To be honest, I hadn’t even considered that possibility.  It made 
sense. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
353 
“So.” 
“So, just let Bonnie take care of things for you on this end,” he whispered, pulling 
me closer still, until I could finally smell the faded, familiar reek of him.  “And let me 
handle things for you on the other end.  Just set those bags down at your feet where 
nobody will see.  That’s right, they’re a shitty couple of bags, anyway, so nobody’s likely 
to bother or notice.”  After I set them down, he pulled me gently away, showing some 
genuine concern for their contents.  I wondered if cobras might spill out to strike him. 
“Now, we’ll take a short walk around the arena, Johnny.  Around to Gate Seven-
A, got it.  Seven-A.” 
“What’s so special about Gate Seven-A.”  I followed reluctantly, pondering the 
lumpy sacks I had deposited on the ground amid so many anxious people. 
“Nothing’s special about the gate, Johnny, but we have a friend working there.” 
“We do.” 
“Sure we do, Johnny.  Believe it or not, you have a lot of friends.  More than you 
ever had before, let me tell you.  Do you have any idea how many guys would love to off 
their wives or partners. Millions, boy, let me guess.  I don’t know for sure, you 
understand, but LOTS AND LOTS, ha ha.”  He slapped my back playfully, and, 
laughing, bundled me into his arm, as we passed before yet another armed officer.  “But 
you, Johnny!  You done it! 
“You really done it!  You didn’t care about all them pretty things you were sure to 
lose.  You didn’t regret none of that fame and fortune you were throwing away.  She 
pissed you off, made you feel low, and WHAM! you put paid to that debt in a big way. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
354 
“Or nearly so, Johnny,” I bristled suddenly, and he feigned to shrink before my 
enraged gaze.  “Nearly so, that’s all I’m saying!  Now here’s your chance, right.  Your 
last chance I think.  Just get around to Gate Seven-A, remember.” 
“Then what.” 
“Then what.” his smile broadened, and he pushed me along, indicating he wasn’t 
going with me.  “Then you just take a good look around, Johnny.  You’re a smart guy.  
You’re sure to figure it out!”  Cackling madly, he returned to the crowd. 
Shrugging him off, but deciding his advice was likely to be sound, I continued on 
my way.  I didn’t doubt his side in this affair.  If anyone could get me through the gates 
and... beyond to her... it would be him and his kind.  Though they wanted it for different 
reasons, they wanted the same thing. 
Me.  I didn’t care what else happened, I didn’t care what went wrong, I didn’t 
care who got hurt... provided I could meet my fate headfirst, hands on.  To the last gasp, 
the final grasp. 
It was a surprisingly long walk.  It was a big arena.  I had forgotten how big. 
When I neared Gate Seven-A, I realized it was an employee entrance.  A thin, 
weathered old man stood at the entrance.  He wore an ill-fitting uniform.  I was uncertain 
at first, as it appeared to be a security guard’s uniform.  Then he saw me, and waved me 
forward. 
Upon examining his gaze, I knew I had arrived.  A fire burned crazily there.  
Smiling vilely, he pushed the gate wide for me and let me inside. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
355 
As I passed, he hissed, “Locker seventeen.  Then out the door to the right, up 
them stairs three flights, and then again to the left.”  I paused to listen, nodding.  “After 
that, super star, you’re on your own!” 
The gate slammed shut at my back, forcing me the rest of the way through.  A 
pair of locker-rooms waited on the far side, one opening from either wall, right and left.  I 
entered the door marked ‘Men’ and went to locker seventeen.  I dressed in the uniform 
that I found inside.  A cap was included. 
I slipped into this, then slipped out the door.  Up the stairs, three flights.  Then 
again to the left. 
Exiting the stairwell, I recognized where I was.  It was the luxury suite 
mezzanine.  Dressed as a staff member, I belonged.  I walked along confidently, hiding 
my face from curious observance by pretending to be interested in the suite numbers.  I 
had something to deliver, after all, so it was easy to fake it. 
Counting the numbers, I realized I was nearing our- I mean, her private suite.  
Nothing but the best would do for her and her friends, I knew.  A pair of men stood at the 
entrance.  From their belts dangled large handguns. 
So close, I considered, licking my lips intrepidly.  I was unafraid.  I damned the 
consequences. 
I didn’t slow my pace, but hastened it, letting my hand around to the back of my 
belt, beneath my sweat-stained livery.  I felt for the handgun kept there, and was 
reassured by its touch. 
As I was drawing it free, something miraculous, or perhaps devilish, occurred.  I 
saw a great flash of light before I heard the concussion.  A storm of dust and debris and 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
356 
loose paper was tossed through the hall.  Several of the windows shattered.  The base 
thunder of it vibrated my teeth together and sucked my lungs empty. 
The two men were shocked off their feet, and both recovered to immediately run 
to see what had happened.  Their guard abandoned, the door was all but opened.  I 
hurried over and turned the knob. 
Stifling a childish snigger of mischievous laughter, I pushed it wide.  Wouldn’t 
they all be surprised to see ME! 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
357 

 

Y 

You 

 Already disturbed by the blast’s concussion, the occupants of the box had 
apparently started for the door, so they were all strangely, expectantly facing me, when I 
burst inside.  As a single unit, they all came up short, their faces wide and white and 
doughy.  Most of them did not recognize me at first, because of the uniform, but they all 
saw the drawn handgun. 
 Crazed, I sought for her among the crowd with anxious eyes.  There!  At the back, 
still seated near the bar! 
 “Johnny!” she gasped into the pregnant silence that filled the room, though the 
arena beyond the windows was wild with screams of terror and surprise. 
 “Jesus Christ!” hissed Edwin Maynard, her financial adviser.  He stood nearest 
me, so the automatic was pointed directly at his chest.  “Johnny!  Don’t do it!” 
 I counted fifteen or so with a glance.  Too many for a single magazine of shells.  
They could take me as I reloaded. 
 Except, I didn’t want them, anyway.  I waggled the gun back and forth and 
stepped to one side of the doorway.  “Get out,” I hissed viciously. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
358 
 Hurriedly, they moved to do so, all save for her and Edwin.  She knew better, and 
the latter seemed to be transfixed by the presence of that huge handgun.  He swallowed 
and blinked and blinked and swallowed, and I could see him playing it out in his mind.  
Should he charge me and grab for the gun.  Should he negotiate.  What.  What should he 
do. 
 I prompted him by repeating, “Get out.  You, too.”  Still he refused to move, and I 
wondered why. 
 When he spoke again, I knew.  He wanted her as badly as I wanted her.  He would 
sacrifice himself to save her.  I laughed. 
 He tried, “Johnny, think about it, man.  You can’t do this.  You don’t want to do 
this.” 
 “I have thought about it, Edwin,” I slurred his name as an insult.  Deciding he had 
made his decision, deciding he should live, or die, with it, I kicked the door shut again, 
and we were alone, the three of us.  I felt the flutter of nervous desire stir my belly to see 
her again.  Her dark eyes lingered on mine, but her face, as always, remained impassive, 
impervious, unreadable.  She stirred he highball with a lazy straw and simply watched.  “I 
can do anything, and I very much want to do this.” 
 “You need help, Johnny.  Professional help.  The foundation will hire a top notch 
attorney and an indisputable medical team.  You could walk away from it all, even now, 
Johnny, if you just put the gun away and let us help you.” 
 “Fool.”  I took  a step closer to her.  He kept himself between us with a matched 
retreat. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
359 
 “Johnny, listen.  Listen to reason.  Put the gun away.  Have a seat here at the bar.  
I’ll make your favorite drink.”  He motioned to the small, waste-high counter that lined 
one wall.  “Southern Comfort on the rocks, right.” 
 I could not remove my hypnotized gaze from hers, but simply raised the handgun 
to point it at the bridge of Edwin’s nose.  I thumbed the hammer back.  After all, I had 
plenty of shells left now.  His face drained pale and he swallowed with difficulty.  For the 
first time, I think he understood. 
 I watched realization dawn in his eyes from the corner of my vision.  The change 
wrought in his face was real and visible.  He sidled to one side, away from that deadly 
muzzle.  He angled for the door.  He opened it.  Then it closed behind him. 
 Without removing my eyes from hers, I made certain the door was shut, and then 
I thumbed it locked.  The knock of that steel bolt was the seal of a tomb.  Darkness 
flooded my vision, so only a single bright spot remained at the center, which bright spot 
was focused on her. 
 She was not afraid.  She simply sat and watched me approach with flat, 
unyielding eyes.  Eyes so dark I felt drowned to bottomless depths within them. 
 Heavy and uncertain, my footfalls stalked the carpeted floor until I was standing 
near enough to her to smell the perfumed curls of her dark hair.  With a long, lingering 
inhale, I sucked in those sweet odors and pondered them as a thick book of ancient 
pictures.  The smell of it reminded me of days on the beach, of nights in our blankets, of 
mornings in our bathroom, of afternoons in our cars.  The smell of it reminded me of all 
the good things I once thought she had been, and urged me more than Edwin’s reedy 
voice ever could to set the handgun aside. 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
360 
 I laid it on the bar and reached for her drink.  I sipped from the highball, placing 
my lips over the pink marks of her lipstick upon the rim, so we kissed in glass.  The 
liquor was heady and good.  Expensive. 
 “Hullo,” I offered grimly, gasping for breath.  “It’s been awhile.” 
 Her smile came pressed thin and severe upon her savage, red lips.  “Not nearly 
long enough.” 
 “Too long.” 
 She shook her head, and turned atop her stool to better face me, her posture 
relaxed and casual.  “So, what do you want, John.  You want to kill me.” 
 I nodded simply, and drained her scotch to the ice cubes.  “Yep.” 
 “You tried it before, and failed.  Are you certain you want to try again.” 
 Again I nodded.  “Yep.” 
 “Why.” 
 “Why.” I repeated incredulously.  “Why.  Because… because you-  you-“ 
 “I what, John.  What did I do to you.”  She snarled, “I gave you everything you 
ever dreamed, and more!  Though it was never enough.” 
 “You gave me everything and more, alright,” I conceded,  “Much more than I 
deserved, in fact.” 
 “Oh, go on, John.  Feel sorry for yourself!  You make me sick!” 
 In that instant, I reached for her, from across miles of damnation and leagues of 
hatred, I reached for her.  I felt my hands fasten around her delicate neck.  I vowed she 
would not survive, this time.  Not this time.  I watched her eyes bulge and her face turn 
red, then purple, then blue… 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
361 
 …then a strobe light flash went off inside my head.  I felt nothing.  I heard 
nothing.  It was just a big, bright flash, the end, and this was all… 

 

Johnny Bullet 

 
 
Stephen Huff 
362 

 

Z  
 
Zoroaster 

 I saw a funny picture, once.  It was of three fishes, each swimming the same 
direction in a line, arranged from the smallest to the largest in order.  Each had its mouth 
wide open, ready to gulp the one before, so the big fish would eat the smaller fish, only to 
be devoured by a bigger fish still.  I always had an impression of a larger fish yet, unseen 
beyond the range of the picture’s frame.  Beyond that fish, another larger again, so on 
into infinity, I guessed, like a mirror that reflected a mirror that reflected a mirror... 

�2鏕l